Raylynx's POV
Soon, it was October. I helped to prepare decorations for the feast. Hagrid's pumpkins were absolutely enormous and carving them with Professor Flitwick was great fun. Hagrid had also brought in the usual live bats. And Dumbledore, in whatever spare time he found, had booked a troupe of dancing skeletons for entertainment.
"Oh, Albus," McGonagall sighed when she saw them. "Wherever did you find them?"
Dumbledore hummed merrily in time to their tapdancing.
When the feast came to an end, the students left first, and the professors stayed behind for a little while to make sure that nobody tried to steal a bat or- heaven forbid- coax a skeleton back to their common room.
"Fred, George," I said sternly, as I watched them eyeing the troupe of skeletons, "be on your way."
"Happy Halloween, Professor!" George called to me.
"Yes," I sighed, "Happy Halloween. Now, please, back to the common room with you."
Professor McGonagall clicked her tongue in disapproval as she watched them leave.
"I do wonder how Molly Weasley manages," she said.
"They're good kids," I replied. "They get carried away sometimes, but it's well-intentioned."
"Yes," she agreed. "That's what makes it so difficult."
We finally filtered out of the Great Hall ourselves, extinguishing the candles in the pumpkins on the way out.
But then, I noticed that there was a crowd gathering outside in the corridor.
Professor McGonagall frowned. She sensed what I sensed- that there was an element of seriousness here. If it had been a prank, there would be cheering and laughter. Instead, there was a hushed silence towards the front of the group.
"Let me through, please!" I said, and I made my way through the crowd, which eventually parted for us professors.
I started to hear yelling and I walked faster. Then, when I stepped in front of the crowd, my eyes widened in utter shock.
Professor McGonagall gasped behind me, and she clutched at her chest.
A pool of water had spilled out into the corridor. On the wall just above the water, foot-high words spelling out: "The Chamber of Secrets has been opened. Enemies of the heir, beware." Underneath the words, there was a hanging cat- Mrs. Norris.
Filch was screaming at Harry, Ron, and Hermione. "You! You've murdered my cat! You've killed her! I'll kill you! I'll -"
"Argus!" Dumbledore had finally stepped to the front of the crowd. He immediately swept past everyone and gently detached Mrs. Norris from the torch bracket upon which she had been hanging.
"Come with me, Argus," he said to Filch. "You, too, Mr. Potter, Mr. Weasley, Miss Granger."
Lockhart stepped forward eagerly. "My office is nearest, Headmaster - just upstairs - please feel free -"
"Thank you, Gilderoy," said Dumbledore.
Professor McGonagall, Snape, and I followed Dumbledore, Lockhart, and Filch. Behind us, Harry, Ron, and Hermione tried to keep up. I shot a look over my shoulder at them. From what I can make out, Filch found the three of them standing in front of the wall before anyone else. Why? And I know that I didn't see Harry, Ron, and Hermione at the feast. I figured I just missed them, since there was so much movement with the skeletons and the bats and all, but perhaps they weren't at the feast after all. What is going on?
Dumbledore lay Mrs. Norris on Lockhart's desk and began to examine her. He gently prodded Mrs. Norris as he murmured words to heal her. But as Mrs. Norris remained stiff, Professor McGonagall and I exchanged dark, worried looks.
If even Dumbledore cannot heal her, I wonder what happened to Mrs. Norris.
Meanwhile, Lockhart was speaking quite a lot. "It was definitely a curse that killed her - probably the Transmogrifian Torture - I've seen it used many times, so unlucky I wasn't there, I know the very countercurse that would have saved her." Behind him, Filch was sobbing dryly.
Dumbledore pulled out his wand and tapped Mrs. Norris, but again, nothing happened.
At last, Dumbledore straightened up. "She's not dead, Argus," he said softly.
"Not dead?" choked Filch, looking through his fingers at Mrs. Norris. "But why's she all - all stiff and frozen?"
"She has been Petrified," said Dumbledore. "But how, I cannot say . . ."
Petrified, I thought. But the Petrification is so strong that she cannot be revived. How is that possible? Who could have done this? This is Dark Magic, and difficult magic.
I could tell from McGonagall's expression that she was thinking along the same lines as me.
"Ask him!" shrieked Filch, turning his blotched and tear-stained face to Harry.
"No second year could have done this," said Dumbledore firmly. "it would take Dark Magic of the most advanced -"
"He did it, he did it!" Filch spat. "You saw what he wrote on the wall! He found - in my office - he knows I'm a - He knows I'm a Squib!"
"I never touched Mrs. Norris!" Harry said loudly. "And I don't even know what a Squib is."
"Rubbish!" snarled Filch. "He saw my Kwikspell letter!"
"If I might speak, Headmaster," said Snape, stepping up. "Potter and his friends may have simply been in the wrong place at the wrong time. But we do have a set of suspicious circumstances here. Why was he in the upstairs corridor at all? Why wasn't he at the Halloween feast?"
"We were at Sir Nicolas' deathday party," Hermione explained immediately.
"Yeah, there were hundreds of ghosts, they'll tell you we were there," Ron said, as Harry nodded beside him.
"But why not join the feast afterward?" Snape queried, his voice dangerously smooth. "Why go up to that corridor?"
Ron and Hermione looked at Harry.
"Because - because -" Harry said, "because we were tired and wanted to go to bed."
I raised my eyebrow.
"Without any supper?" said Snape, a triumphant smile flickering across his gaunt face. "I didn't think ghosts provided food fit for living people at their parties."
"We weren't hungry," said Ron loudly, but his stomach gave a huge rumble even as he spoke.
Snape's smile widened. "I suggest, Headmaster, that Potter is not being entirely truthful," he said. "It might be a good idea if he were deprived of certain privileges until he is ready to tell us the whole story. I personally feel he should be taken off the Gryffindor Quidditch team until he is ready to be honest."
"Really, Severus," said Professor McGonagall sharply, "I see no reason to stop the boy playing Quidditch. This cat wasn't hit over the head with a broomstick. There is no evidence at all that Potter has done anything wrong."
Meanwhile, I saw that Dumbledore was giving Harry a searching look. I myself knew that gaze all too well.
"Innocent until proven guilty, Severus," he said firmly.
Snape looked furious. Filch, too, shrieked in a rage, "My cat has been Petrified! I want to see some punishment!"
"We will be able to cure her, Argus," said Dumbledore patiently. "Professor Sprout recently managed to procure some Mandrakes. As soon as they have reached their full size, I will have a potion made that will revive Mrs. Norris."
"I'll make it," Lockhart offered. "I must have done it a hundred times. I could whip up a Mandrake Restorative Draught in my sleep -"
"Excuse me," said Snape icily. "But I believe I am the Potions master at this school."
The silence that followed was quite awkward.
"You may go," Dumbledore said to Harry, Ron, and Hermione, who left as quickly as they could.
Professor Snape shot Lockhart an icy look as he left.
McGonagall kindly helped Filch out of the room.
"Professor Kingsley."
I looked up to see Dumbledore beckoning.
I left Lockhart's office.
"You are unusually severe," Dumbledore remarked, speaking quietly as Lockhart trailed after us.
"Of course," I replied, "a cat has just been Petrified and you were unable to revive her through spells alone."
"Yes," Dumbledore said. "The Petrification was uniquely thorough. It was not a spell that one could lift, but something that must be rejected from the inside out- that is, through a potion that one consumes."
"Have you ever encountered such Petrification before?" I asked Dumbledore.
His eyes flashed. Softly, he murmured, "Yes. Fifty years ago, it killed a young girl."
"Where?" I asked.
"Here," Dumbledore said somberly. "At Hogwarts."
I sensed that there was far more to the story, but we had come to the Great Hall, and Dumbledore parted ways with me quickly. I stared up at him, wondering what he wasn't telling me.
Dumbledore's words rang in my mind: Fifty years ago, it killed a young girl. I knew already who it was: Myrtle.
I wanted to move that night, but I knew that watch had been doubled, if not tripled, and so I decided to stay in my chambers.
The next night, I was assigned duty with Filch, but to my frustration, he stood guard over the corridor, seeking justice for his cat.
I had to wait until the next week, when Filch and Snape were both off guard duty, to sneak down to the girls' bathroom on the second floor.
I walked over to the sinks and bent down. Sure enough, I saw the small snake still engraved in the faucet. I breathed out. Could this be the Chamber of Secrets? Is Slytherin's hidden chamber the same as the Chamber of Secrets that has, according to the message on the wall, been opened?
I had my answer quickly as, over the next few days following the attack, the legend of the Chamber of Secrets spread from student to student and even professor to professor like wildfire.
The legend said that Slytherin had built a hidden chamber in the castle, of which the other founders knew nothing. The heir alone would be able to unseal the Chamber of Secrets, unleash the horror within, and use it to purge the school of all who were unworthy to study magic. The 'horror within' was said to be some sort of monster, which the Heir of Slytherin alone can control.
The professors, speaking amongst themselves in the staff room, were adamant that such a Chamber did not exist, let alone a true monster.
"If scores of Hogwarts Headmasters and Headmistresses have not found it, it simply cannot exist," Professor Sinistra said resolutely.
That's not true. It's real. I know it's real.
"Raylynx."
I turned to see Professor McGonagall. She peered into my face and she said, "You look unwell. You should get some sleep."
As I left the staff room, I realized that it was highly likely that only three people in this castle knew that the Chambers of Secrets existed: Dumbledore, myself, and whoever this Heir of Slytherin was.
But who was the Heir of Slytherin? Were they walking amongst the students or professors at this very moment? Could it possibly be Gilderoy Lockhart? And Dumbledore's words now made sense to me: Perhaps someone had stopped Harry from coming in through the King's Cross barrier to protect him.
My heart thumped hard inside my chest as I realized what this meant: Harry was in danger yet again. I would have to halt my search in Little Hangleton and stay around Hogwarts as much as possible, in case Harry was put in danger.
I also realized that the monster within was the basilisk- with its petrifying eyes. I didn't understand how it could possible around the school, however. The corridor was dangerous, because it was right next to the girls' bathroom where the entrance to the Chamber was, but apart from that, I couldn't imagine the gigantic snake slithering around the school unseen, so in that regards, I thought that all of the students were safe, especially as the corridor had been roped off and was constantly under guard by the professors and Filch.
But I had to tell Dumbledore about the basilisk. As it was already late evening, I resolved to tell Dumbledore tomorrow. I would catch him right after the morning Quidditch match.
The Quidditch game began at precisely eleven o'clock. The Slytherin players were green streaks in the air as the Malfoys had bought them all the newest and fanciest broomsticks.
"Come on, Harry," I muttered under my breath.
Snape was looking more expectantly smug than ever.
The score became 60-0 in a matter of minutes.
Oliver Wood, furious, called a time-out.
The time-out ran out. As the game began again, I suddenly realized why Slytherin had been scoring so well. It hadn't just been because of their sleek brooms. Having played Quidditch myself, I realized that the game had been missing the Gryffindor Beaters- Fred and George Weasley- and one of the Bludgers- because the Bludger was tracking Harry.
Sure enough, Harry was twirling in mid-air, trying to keep the Bludger from hitting him.
"Professor," I said, grabbing McGonagall's shoulder. "Look at that Bludger! I'm sure someone's tampered with it."
"What do you mean?" she said sharply.
Wham!
The Bludger smashed into Harry's elbow. McGonagall and I both winced. It looked like he had broken his arm.
Harry suddenly shot forward with his other hand out. He grabbed the Snitch, and then, he headed straight for the ground.
"Arresto momentum!" I shouted from the stands, pointing my wand at his broom.
Harry slowed for a moment before he fell off of his broom, hitting the mud with a splattering thud.
The crowd brought into applause, but McGonagall and I both took off, running down the stands. McGonagall fell behind as I ran full sprint down to the pitch to Harry.
Professor Lockhart, who had not been in the Professors' box, but had been watching from below, had already gotten there.
I saw him point his wand at Harry's arm.
"Wait, Professor-!" I began.
A flash of bright light blinded me for a moment.
When I opened my eyes again, I gasped in horror.
Harry's arm was now devoid of bones. It flopped about like a dummy's hand.
"Ah, Harry, if you would just toddle up to the hospital wing?" Lockhart said.
"Gilderoy, for Merlin's sake!" I cried out. Ignoring the crowd of students around us, I yelled, "What the hell did you do to him?"
McGonagall, who had finally caught up to me, pushed me out of the way to shut me up. "Ms. Granger, Mr. Weasley, if you would escort Potter up to the hospital wing to Madam Pomfrey immediately?"
She held me back firmly as I stepped towards Lockhart.
"Gilderoy, I do believe you should be on your way," McGonagall suggested.
"Ah, yes," Lockhart said, staring at me with wide eyes.
"Raylynx," McGonagall warned. Her eyes were sharp, as they apt to do when she was serious.
I sighed heavily.
"Harry will be all right," McGonagall said, letting me go. "Poppy will have fix him up."
I nodded. "I know."
Then, I looked up at McGonagall and I said, "You saw it too, didn't you? The Bludger, and how it was focused only on Harry."
McGonagall paused. "I believe so, but I cannot be sure. I wasn't watching it the whole time."
"Professor, you know as well as I that Bludgers are supposed to go after all players indiscriminately. That Bludger was focused only on Harry, to the point that Fred and George had to stay beside him to protect him."
McGonagall listened intently to what I was saying. "We shall investigate the Bludger," she assured me. "Now, we should head back to the castle."
She was right. We were the only ones left standing on the Quidditch Pitch. I didn't notice a tiny house elf look back at the Quidditch pitch as Lucius Malfoy walked off of the grounds, disgraced.
I examined the Bludger and all of the other Quidditch balls that very afternoon, turning them over in my hands and trying to trace magic on them. But all of them seemed completely normal now.
I frowned, and I tried again, focusing harder as I cast my tracing spells, trying to detect any kind of wizard or witch's magic on the Bludger.
Filch, who had let me in to examine the balls, rattled his keys angrily at me. "Yeh've been in there long enough! Get out of there. It's time for your shift, anyhow."
"All right, all right," I said. "Keep your trousers on."
Filch was right, though. It was time for my shift. Our shifts had been lengthened to start earlier and end later, though nothing had happened since Mrs. Norris was Petrified.
I sighed. I'd meant to go speak with Dumbledore. I would have to wait until I was reporting at the end of my shift.
I joined Professor McGonagall as we walked across the grounds. By the time we'd finished our patrol of the grounds, it was time for dinner.
Then, we closed the school doors and started to walk along the castle together. We started at the corridor where that ghastly writing was, and then we made our way throughout the castle. Though it would be quicker to split up, I rather liked spending time with McGonagall. She was a bit irritated with me for making her walk the whole castle with me, and sometimes she'd seen me off on my own, but I knew that Elphinstone had passed away this last summer and though we never spoke of it, she seemed to enjoy taking our walks together, as I'm sure it helped her to take her mind off of her sadness.
A couple of hours later, well into the night, we were tired and near the end of our shift, passing the corridor where we had started.
"Do you think I could go and see Harry?" I asked McGonagall.
McGonagall looked at me and said, "Well, he's likely to be asleep."
"I know," I replied. "I just want to check in on him."
"Poppy won't be happy," she warned.
"Yes, I realize that, too," I said.
McGonagall sighed. "Do as you wish, then, Raylynx. But don't say that I didn't warn you."
I nodded, and I began to walk up the stairs to the Hospital Wing on my own, when suddenly, I saw it- a stiff body on the stairs, lying silently, frozen.
"Minerva," I said sharply, trying not to scream.
Immediately alerted to the tone of my voice, Professor McGonagall raced to my side.
Then, she gasped, horrified, as she saw the young boy on the stairs, stiff as a wooden board.
I immediately drew out my wand and raced over to the boy.
McGonagall followed me, but her eyes flickered into the shadows beyond me, and she raised her wand in defense.
I paused when my foot sank into something soft. Stepping back, I realized it was a bunch of grapes.
Avoiding the squashed grapes, I knelt beside the young boy. His eyes were wide open and his hands were stuck up in front of him as he was holding his camera.
"Colin Creevy," Professor McGonagall said, recognizing him as a first-year Gryffindor.
"He was carrying grapes," I told her.
She sighed. "He may have been trying to sneak up to the Hospital Wing to visit Potter. I've noticed Mr. Creevy following Harry for weeks, trying to get photographs and asking for autographs."
I exhaled and then I stood up. "I'm certain he's been Petrified. I can't do anything for him."
"No," Professor McGonagall agreed. "Neither of us can. Stay with the boy, Raylynx. I will go and get Professor Dumbledore."
I nodded.
"Be on your guard," she warned.
She left, and I stayed there, thinking furiously.
How could a giant serpent affect someone who was climbing the stairs?
Fear rose within me as I realized that the basilisk was not confined to the corridor.
How is the basilisk getting around, then?
I felt horribly guilty as I realized that I should have told Dumbledore about what I knew earlier, and perhaps, Colin Creevey might have been spared. I could not ponder on this for too long, though, as Dumbledore and McGonagall appeared shortly.
"We must take him to the Hospital Wing," Dumbledore said, after a quick examination.
"He is Petrified, isn't he?" I asked.
"Yes," Dumbledore replied. "Thankfully, he is alive."
We carried Collin up to the Hospital Wing and laid him gently atop a bed.
"Get Madam Pomfrey," whispered Dumbledore, and Professor McGonagall to wake Poppy.
I noticed that Harry was sleeping in a cot at the end of the row. I tried to peer over at him, hoping that he was all right and sleeping painlessly, but then Professor McGonagall returned with Poppy, who was pulling a cardigan on over her nightdress.
She breathed in sharply when she saw Collin.
"What happened?" Poppy whispered, leaning over Collin's Petrified body.
"Another attack," Dumbledore explained. "Minerva and Raylynx found him on the stairs."
"There was a bunch of grapes next to him," said Professor McGonagall. "We think he was trying to sneak up here to visit Potter."
"Petrified?" whispered Madam Pomfrey.
"Yes," said Professor McGonagall. "But I shudder to think ... If Raylynx had not been on her way to the Hospital Wing, who knows what might have happened."
I leaned over and carefully wrenched the camera out of Colin's rigid grip. "You don't think he managed to get a picture of his attacker?" I suggested.
In a heavy voice, Dumbledore said, "Open it, Professor Kingsley."
I did. A jet of steam hissed out of the camera. I turned my face away in the nick of time.
"Good gracious!" said Madam Pomfrey.
The acrid smell of burnt plastic filled the air.
"Melted," said Madam Pomfrey wonderingly. "All melted..."
"What does this mean, Albus?" Professor McGonagall asked urgently.
"It means," said Dumbledore, "that the Chamber of Secrets is indeed open again."
Madam Pomfrey clapped a hand to her mouth.
Professor McGonagall stared at Dumbledore. "But, Albus ... surely ... who?"
"The question is not who," said Dumbledore, his eyes on Colin. "The question is, how…"
As we left the Hospital Wing, I called out to Dumbledore.
"Headmaster," I said. "I realize that it's very late, but I must speak with you."
Dumbledore merely nodded.
I followed him up to his office.
Tiredly, he said, "What is it that you wish to speak to me about, Professor Kingsley?"
"Professor, I know what-"
My voice choked, and my chest suddenly thrummed with a golden, spell-binding energy.
I gasped and put my hand to my chest.
Dumbledore stepped towards me, suddenly concerned.
"Raylynx?"
"I-" I coughed and gripped my neck with my hand.
Inside of my mind, I heard a deep voice growl, "You cannot speak of your trials for the King's Wand."
I growled back and whispered fiercely, "I don't even have you anymore."
"You have me. I have never left you."
Dumbledore was watching me with a fierce expression on his face.
I shook my head and breathing hard, I came back to reality again.
"I'm sorry, Professor Dumbledore…" I murmured. "It seems that the information is not mine to give."
Dumbledore's eyes were blazing blue, but he only inclined his head.
"Headmaster," I said, "you said that the question was not who opened the Chamber of Secrets, but how. What did you mean by that? Does that mean that you believe that Voldemort is behind this, even though we know he's in Albania?"
Dumbledore seemed to weigh his thoughts carefully before revealing to me, "Fifty years ago, when the young girl passed away, Tom Riddle was at Hogwarts."
"Do you mean to say that he opened the Chamber?"
"I do not know," Dumbledore said. "But it would make sense for Tom Riddle to be the heir of Slytherin."
"Why do you say that?" I pressed. "There are many Dark Wizards. Not all of them can be Slytherin's heir."
"No, but you see, Tom Riddle was a Parselmouth."
"A Parselmouth?"
"He could speak to snakes. He never revealed this ability to anyone except me."
I frowned skeptically. "He trusted you with that information?"
"No, but I was the one who told Tom Riddle that he was, in fact, a wizard. He became over-excited and revealed things about himself that he regretted. At the young age of eleven, he told me that he was already communicating adeptly with snakes."
"I still don't understand," I said, "why that marks him as Salazar Slytherin's heir."
"It may not. But there are not many Parselmouths in this world, and Salazar Slytherin's emblem is a serpent because he, too, had the natural ability to speak with snakes. That is why I find it highly possible that Tom Riddle, or Voldemort, is Slytherin's heir. I have never confirmed this, but I suspect it is true."
I felt a spike of fear as I recalled the giant serpent Sehtzer had fought with in Albania.
"But Voldemort's gone," I said slowly. "He cannot challenge us without a body. He cannot have opened the Chamber of Secrets- at least, not himself."
Dumbledore nodded thoughtfully. "And that is why I ask- how?"
