Dumbledore found Severus that night back in the corridor with the blood-stained walls. He'd been using every spell he knew to try and reveal something, bring something back from the cold stone that would solve this maddening new mystery, but all it had been doing was feeding the rage Severus felt every minute of every day. It had grown to a peak that had Severus tempted to start using more… unsavory means of uncovering who or what had been there when Dumbledore had arrived and ruined his plans.

They both stared at the writing with very different eyes. Severus wanted to reach into the past and take it by the throat, while Dumbledore only looked tired and somber, as if he'd been expecting this all along.

"Anything?" Dumbledore asked in a voice that already knew the answer.

Severus shot a Stunner at theletter w, growing even angrier when it exploded into sparks and faded away like smoldering ashes.

"I thought as much," Dumbledore sighed heavily. "How is Ariel?"

He thought back to the hand that had clung to his when the rest of the students and staff had arrived and how he'd pried her off of him. Every atom in his body had felt like it was rioting against it, but the girl had almost instantly been surrounded by her cronies, the crowd carrying her away and up to her tower. Filch had been calling for the girl's head on a pike until Dumbledore had managed to talk him off the ledge.

"I've no idea," Severus finally said. "Scared, I would imagine, but she'll never admit it. She ran after the damn thing like a bat out of hell. She and her little sidekicks are undoubtedly scheming as we speak."

"Was there anything else at all?" Dumbledore stared up at the words. "Besides the cat, of course."

Severus bared his teeth as crimson exploded from the end of his wand. "She said it was going to kill someone. She wasn't too far off, it seems."

It's back

Can you hear it?

Dumbledore's whiskers twitched. "Well, that would explain her zealous pursuit. Thankfully it's only rooster blood, I've been told. Hagrid mentioned that several of his have gone missing."

"Don't you dare act like her risking her neck is endearing."

"I don't find it amusing in the slightest, Severus." Dumbledore raised his hand over the stone, not touching it, only hovering. "I'm simply admiring that in the presence of such fear that she would think of others above herself."

Severus felt like every one of his tendons were about to snap. He recalled Miss Evans standing between Granger and the Bludger, her steadfastness in the face of harm. For a brief moment he imagined her face frozen in fear — as it had before in that damn alcove — twisted and helpless — and pictured her stuck like that instead of Filch's fucking cat.

The next Stunner he cast managed to leave a scorch mark around the e in beware.

"Stress the severity of this to her," Dumbledore said when Severus did not respond. "After last year… with similar events unfolding, I am concerned for her. I am very glad you were here."

"She shouldn't have left the Feast in the first place." Severus muttered darkly. "That girl is a magnet for trouble."

Dumbledore bowed his head. "At least we had a bit of warning… again, I cannot emphasize how fortunate she was that she had you."

If Severus had bothered to peel back the layers in his words, he knew he would find the same nonsense about love and loyalty and how touched Dumbledore was that Severus was looking out for the girl. He had no idea that below all of the wonder was the burden of responsibility — or he did and thought that love would somehow make up for it all.

"Any theories?" Severus asked. He turned over the pocket watch in his hands — Gryffindor Tower.

"Many, each one as unlikely as the next."

Severus made a noise of annoyance.

"Did Ariel mention why she left the Feast in the first place?" he asked lightly — too lightly for it to be general curiosity.

The quiet desperation in her thin face flooded Severus' mind. He hadn't seen that look in some time. "She was unable to enjoy the Feast."

"I see," Dumbledore sighed, looking older than when he had first appeared. "If the Chamber has in fact been opened, I fear that the castle is no longer safe for the students."

Severus had heard the legends, passed down every year in Slytherin. Lucius had been the one to tell his year of the monster that was supposedly hidden away in the darkest depths of the school, waiting to be woken by the one true Heir of Slytherin, who would purge the school of those who were not worthy. Many of them had scoffed at it, waving it off as a story told to first years to scare them, even though none of the Slytherins had anything to fear since Muggleborns were rarely Sorted there. Ridiculous, of course, until Lucius had one day told him in passing that the Chamber had been opened once before, and that it was likely it would be again.

The memory made Severus' blood run cold, and suddenly he realized that for the first time since the war, there was a calculated attack unfolding. Quirrell had been desperate and half mad — Lucius was cunning and patient.

She'll learn her lesson soon enough

It's going to kill someone

"You think whoever is doing this," Severus began slowly. "will attack students."

"Nothing so grave." Dumbledore shook his head, "For all we know, it could be just a cruel prank. There are several dark curses that could easily replicate, or even, in some cases, actually Petrify their victims."

"But what student could fulfill such a feat?" Severus began to pace the length of the wall. "Half of them are so dimwitted that they don't know their wand from a fork."

Dumbledore's lips twitched slightly. "I still find it fascinating that after all these years of teaching, you still don't allow yourselves to see the potential in them."

He nearly rolled his eyes, feeling a twinge of agitation at the sudden change of subject. Dumbledore had gone on for years about how the brats were beacons of knowledge, their legacy, the hope of the future and other such nonsense. Granted, not every student Severus had the displeasure of teaching had been a complete and utter failure. His NEWT class had become his only solace over the years, since he only accepted the best.

"Then what of the voice Miss Evans heard?" Severus pinched the bridge of his nose. "Unless the girl is having audible hallucinations, I can hardly believe that you think it's a mere coincidence."

"I don't," Dumbledore shook his head. "I find the timing of it and Lucius' threat to be rather alarming."

Severus felt something sharp pierce his chest. "If whatever this is… what if it targets her?"

Dumbledore raised a silvery eyebrow at him. "Are you not aware of the legend?"

"Of course I am!" he snapped back. "But Lucius made a clear, and seemingly legitimate threat against her! I can't protect her if Hogwarts is no longer the safest place for her!"

"Help will always be given at Hogwarts to those who ask," said Dumbledore.

"Is that so?" Severus spat. "Well, then perhaps Slytherin's monster will be so courteous as to cease and desist his endeavors if we simply ask."

"You misunderstand," Dumbledore shook his head. "to think Lucius Malfoy to be somehow controlling from the outside is unrealistic. I believe, if we are to assume he has somehow allowed the Chamber of Secrets to be opened, that he is not directly responsible for tonight's events."

"So you think he is a catalyst?"

"Precisely." he nodded, and then, his eyes lowered in thought. "It is how, then, that we must set our minds on uncovering."

"And if we don't?" Severus asked flatly. "What else are we to do?"

Something moved through them that Severus couldn't put in words. Dumbledore's gaze was penetrating. If Severus hadn't known better, he might've thought he were searching for the heart he had lost, almost a decade ago.

"Fortunate indeed." Dumbledore murmured. He placed a hand on Severus' shoulder as he left, his blue eyes piercing and pulsing in the dim light.

Ariel had terrible dreams all night — there were people shouting, but she could only hear their voices, their bodies melded into the shadows.

Tell me what it said

Time to kill… kill…

When she reached for them, the darkness only grew bigger, somehow, and there was a single green light in front of her, but it was miles away.

Ariel Evans must not return to Hogwarts

Blood… blood…

She awoke for the fifth time and decided she couldn't go back to sleep — back to her nightmares. Being awake wasn't much better either, because now, all she could think about was The Voice and the writing on the wall.

She sat up and glanced at the coin. Snape looked like the kind of bloke who didn't sleep, but if Ariel snuck down to the dungeons in the middle of the night after what had happened, she was almost certain Snape would burn her Invisibility Cloak. She wanted answers but he'd been vehement that she leave immediately once Filch had started calling for her head. In the moment she'd been almost thankful but now, Ariel only felt unease.

Throwing her legs over the side of the bed, she checked her drawers for Dreamless Sleep — there wasn't any, but there hadn't been in some time. Snape wouldn't say it, but Ariel was pretty sure he thought she was becoming too dependent on it, which was why he'd started with the Occlumency.

She huffed and sat there for a while in the darkness, listening to Hermione's light breaths and Lavender's snoring. She strained her ears to see if she could hear anything else but there was nothing — no voices hidden in the walls or the floor. She was pretty sure Lavender's snoring was enough to deter anyone creeping around inside the walls, anyway.

Her body exhausted but her mind wide awake, Ariel sat cross-legged on the bed and pulled her hair into a ponytail (her hair was finally long enough for her to be able to do this and it made her life ten billion times easier). She closed her eyes and tried to picture her ocean, letting each blood-red word from the wall fall into the water. The rush of waves felt like it was massaging her brain as she let it take everything below the surface.

Kill… tear…

Tell me what it said —

Ariel's eyes shot open. Her heart was beating fast and heavy, like a horse trotting through sand on the beach. She could feel the cold relief slipping away as she leaned forward, trying to steady her breathing.

She reached for the coin almost instinctively. The tails side read Private Quarters. When she pressed her lips against the other side and whispered, "Are you awake?" it disappeared.

It is loss that teaches us the worth of things

It was at moments like these, at midnights and musings, that Ariel wished more than anything that she still had Mum's letter. Maybe reading it just one more time — just one more that was all she wanted — would've been the missing piece to solving Snape. He had been there all summer until Hermione had rescued her but now that they were back at Hogwarts, he was acting as he did last year — like she was just another student.

Were loss and rejection the same thing? Could you lose something you had wanted, something you had hoped and dreamed for, only for it to refute you? Was it fair to mourn something you never even had?

Ariel sat hunched over the side of the bed for a long time. When she finally looked up, she could've sworn she saw the door to the dormitory slide shut silently. It had been opened just a crack before.

She rubbed at her face and hugged her knees to her chest.

You don't want the answer to that

Severus stared blearily into the fire as it crackled and popped, on its last legs.

He couldn't sleep, the girl's face all he could see in the dark. It pulled at him like a tether wound too tightly, unable to sleep.

I hate this night, the girl had said. Severus had never felt more akin to her with that statement. He loathed Halloween. She'd sat at the Gryffindor table, picking at her food, and offering pleasant smiles for the sake of everyone around her, but Severus had sensed that she would never truly be able to sit through a Halloween Feast without the anchor of grief tied around her ankles, weighing her down.

Will you ever tell me?

I hate when you pretend like I'm invisible

What did the girl fucking want from him? Severus was doing as much as he could — he was patrolling and checking in with her. For Christ's sake, he'd followed her out of the Great Hall to make sure she didn't get into any trouble. If he hadn't —

The pocket watch vibrated on the table beside him. Severus grabbed it and turned it over, heart and head pounding, until he saw the message.

Are you awake?

That damnable girl —

He slammed it back down on the table and massaged his temple forcefully. If that girl only knew —

The timer he'd set went off, buzzing loudly from beside the simmering cauldron. It had turned snow white, with a shimmer like moonlight on a lake. It was missing only one thing. It would work — the potion he'd created. It would take months to finish brewing after this final step, but it would be ready by Christmas. She would have it soon — sooner than he'd anticipated, but he'd managed to make some modifications to speed the process along.

One last thing — just the one. The hardest part. The ingredient he had been dreading.

Severus closed his eyes and let his Shields down, allowing in the dazzling light from summer to illuminate every corner of his mind. In the memory, Lily sat across from him, twirling her wand in-between her fingers.

"Do you ever think about it?" she asked him suddenly, the sunlight reflecting off her wine-red hair.

Severus looked up from his book. "I hate to break this to you, but I can't read your mind."

"Kids, Sev." she gazed thoughtfully up at the sky, squinting against the sun. "Petunia and Mum were talking about it the other day. Nothing serious, just in passing… gods, I can't imagine Petunia being a mum."

Severus had snorted. "A devil's snare would make a better parent."

Lily grinned back, her smile dazzling. "I'd like to be a mum, I think."

"You would hate it."

Her smile faded. "Why do you say that?"

"You have so much more potential. A child would only weigh you down."

The look she had given him — her green eyes like freshly watered cloves, the corners of her mouth twisted only slightly upwards. She looked both moved and devastated before looking away, back up at the sky.

Severus pictured her face and let the joy fill him up, swell like the roll of waves as his grief crashed into him. Every piece of her memory was tinged with it, touched and poisoned, but not ruined.

It hurt every day, the absence of someone who was once there.

He pointed the wand at his chest, where his heart had once been. "Expecto Patronum."

Ariel almost wished she'd never gotten out of the bed after the morning she'd had.

She'd had an awful time getting ready for classes after seeing herself in the mirror. Her ponytail had turned into a giant bird's nest in her sleep, dark circles under her eyes. Thankfully, Lavender had some sort of hair product that magically detangled her hair while Hermione offered to brush it out.

The Common Room was buzzing with chatter about last night. Ariel and Hermione quickly found Ron and headed down to breakfast, trying to look inconspicuous as every group of students who passed shot them strange looks. Some of them were curious, others accusatory. Ariel didn't care much — she'd told Ron and Hermione everything last night, but they'd concluded that there wouldn't be much to do until the morning.

After learning what the Chamber of Secrets was during History of Magic, Ariel was almost certain that this was what Dobby had been warning her about — and of course there was a horrible, terrible monster who would purge the school of Muggleborns, because why wouldn't there have been?

"I knew Salazar Slytherin was a creep," Ron was saying as they sat in the library, on their break before lunch. "could you imagine being in Slytherin, with all that Pureblood nonsense starting in your House? I bet Malfoy loves it…"

Ariel chewed on the end of her quill instead of answering him. The Sorting Hat had said she'd do great things in Slytherin… and sometimes, she wondered if Snape would've liked her more if they'd been in the same House. She was happy to be in Gryffindor with Ron and Hermione, though. She wouldn't have changed a thing about it, especially after hearing about the Chamber from Professor Binns.

"I don't think the monster cares about Houses, much." she said instead.

"Yeah, but there aren't many Muggleborns in Slytherin." Ron muttered. "I don't think there's any, to be honest — not any that I know of."

"The voice just wanted to kill…" Ariel tried to stifle the shiver that went down her spine. "It didn't say anything about Muggleborns or — that word."

"Maybe Percy was right," Ron sighed. "Maybe it's just someone having a laugh. Everyone hates Filch and that bloody cat."

"Then how do you explain the voice?"

He shrugged. "I don't know… I'd much rather it be a prank than an actual monster, though."

She thought of the Smoke Monster rising from the floor, moving through the walls, reaching out for her —

"Yeah," Ariel muttered. "Me too."

Hermione returned a few minutes later — Ron had been steadily copying off of Ariel's parchment for the past ten minutes, but she didn't care much. Hermione was flush and out of breath, looking deeply annoyed as she fell into a chair.

"There are no more copies of Hogwarts: A History — can you believe it?" she exclaimed.

"Yes," Ariel replied. "I'd reckon the entire school knows about the Chamber now. Neville mentioned something about talisman at the end of History."

"I don't think we'll be missing anything, anyway." Ron supplied, nudging Ariel's arm so he could see the next paragraph. "Not much to say about a myth."

Hermione pursed her lips. "It would be helpful to have all the facts. Like this Heir — can he really control the monster? Or can he just release it?"

"I've got a better one," Ariel sat back in her chair with her arms crossed. "Who could be the Heir?"

"Someone who hates Muggleborns," Ron supplied. "And they'd have to be a Slytherin, right?"

"Possibly," Hermione said slowly. "but who hates Muggleborns enough to want to kill them?"

The three of them all looked at each other at once with the same exact thought.

"Malfoy." they said simultaneously.

Ariel couldn't help it — she burst out laughing. She laughed so hard and for so long that Hermione cast some sort of spell on her that made her stop instantly, like a vacuum sucking up a dust bunny.

"I don't see what's so funny," Hermione said tersely. Her brown eyes were narrowed in Serious Disapproval.

"It's not," Ariel managed to gulp out. "He's just… so insufferable."

"And if it is him, he's not exactly trying to hide it." Ron rolled his eyes. "You heard him last night - 'you'll be next, Mudbloods!'"

Hermione drummed her fingers on the tabletop. "So then… how do we prove it's him? We'd have to get him to confess, somehow. If we catch him in the act, it won't do any good since we'll be Petrified."

"How do you suppose we'll do that?"

"We need to get inside the Slytherin common room and ask Malfoy a few questions without him realizing it's us."

Ron snorted. "Oh yeah – easy peasy."

Hermione glanced at Ariel — sometimes, she had the suspicion that Snape could read minds, but she knew with unwavering certainty that Hermione could read hers, somehow. Snape had mentioned it only last week, in Potions class, in passing. Hermione had raised her hand to ask more about it (or ask if the passing comment was going to be on the test) but he had ignored her.

Ariel felt a grin spreading across her face. "Polyjuice Potion."

Hermione had managed to catch Professor Lockhart in the library earlier, where he signed off on them checking out Moste Potente Potions from the Restricted Section. He hadn't even looked at what they were taking out before nearly blinding them with his perfectly white teeth and waltzing off. Ariel and Ron's jaws had been practically on the ground, stunned into silence that he'd just let them take out a book that would show them how to poison the entire school, but Hermione had smugly shrugged, undoubtedly pleased that Lockhart had called her his smartest student.

The trio had made the risky journey back up the corridor with the writing on the wall. Luckily, Filch had gone to lunch like everyone else, which gave them time to snoop around and look for any clues. Unfortunately, all they'd found was that Ron had a debilitating fear of spiders and a broken girl's loo.

As they left Moaning Myrtle's bathroom, Ariel happened to glance towards the other side of the hallway just in time to see Snape coming up from the dungeons. She averted her eyes and tried to move the three of them along, but he'd already caught sight of them with a very bad book he would most definitely confiscate.

"Miss Evans!" he boomed.

"Take the book!" Ariel hissed as she shoved it in Hermione's bag. "Quick — hide it under the others —"

Ron swore loudly, blocking Snape's view with his body. "Merlin's beard, hurry up!"

"I'm trying!" Hermione shot back, a little hysterically. She pointed her wand inside her bag and whispered something frantically.

Ariel whirled around as Hermione closed her bag, trying not to look as guilty as she felt – and was. They were supposed to be at lunch, not back here. Not to mention that in order to brew the Polyjuice, Ariel was going to need to get into Snape's private storeroom somehow. The idea of stealing from him made her feel queasy.

Snape stopped mere inches away from them. His breathing was heavy and labored, and Ariel could see what he was clutching in his hand – the pocket watch.

Damn. She'd forgotten the Tracking Charm went both ways. It had been a while since he'd done this sort of thing… although last night…

"What are the three of you doing up here?" Snape asked in a dangerously quiet voice. His black eyes locked onto Ariel's, burning hot.

"We were —"

"I lost my ink pot —"

"Got turned around —"

The three of them all sputtered out excuses at once, rambling on as Snape seemed to swell with anger. He was already much taller than them, but he seemed to become even bigger, his robes more imposing, his glare more menacing. Ariel half expected steam to come pouring out of his ears.

"What do you have there, Miss Granger?" Snape asked softly.

Ariel's heart jumped up into her throat. He's going to kill me.

"J-just my textbooks, sir." Hermione managed to strangle out. She'd gone white as a sheet. "Ariel and Ron were waiting for me while I used the loo –"

"Really?" Snape whispered. It was so quiet that Ariel almost had to strain to hear him. "This girl's loo? Out of the dozens in the school – this specific one?"

Their silence was deafening. Ariel pretended to be fascinated by the uniformity of the stone floor.

"When you've got to go –" Ron started meekly.

"Silence, Weasley!" Snape bit out, his nostrils flaring. "Hand over your bag, Granger, or I'll see all three of you to the Headmaster's office myself."

He's going to kill me, he's going to kill me, he's going to kill me –

"There's nothing inside of it that I shouldn't, Professor." Hermione said, but she winced when Snape snatched it from her hands, dumping the contents onto the floor. To Ariel's shock, the Very Illegal and Very Bad potions textbook wasn't there. Three of the four books were Lockhart's, along with their History of Magic text.

Snape stared at it for a long moment like he was ready to commit book-genocide. He gave a quick flick of his wand, causing all three of them to flinch, before practically throwing Hermione's bag at her.

"Get out of my sight." he whispered. They started to bolt, but Ariel quickly screeched to a halt when Snape snarled, "Not you, girl."

She turned around to face him as though it was automation. She tried to look innocent, but his eyes sliced right through any facade she tried to put up. He knew exactly what they'd been doing — he'd call it Gryffindor idiocy, but Ariel thought of it more as investigating. There were just some stuff adults were too big to see.

She could practically see the smoke trail from where Ron and Hermione had fled.

"Do you have a death wish?" Snape towered over her, surrounding her like a storm.

Ariel sighed. "No…"

"No?" he repeated back, venom pooling into the air around them.

"I just wanted to see if the stupid writing was still here, that's all." Ariel mustered together her fiercest scowl. "Why hasn't Filch taken it down, anyway?"

"He can't get it off," Snape waved his hand dismissively. "I would have thought that last night would have been enough of a deterrent for you to stay away."

Ariel put her hands on her hips. "It's not like Slytherin's monster stuck around."

His expression shuttered, like wind on a windowpane. "Heard about the legend, have you?" he sneered.

"The entire school has, by now." Ariel said. "If not, everyone will know after lunch."

Snape leaned against the wall, suddenly looked very tired. He rubbed at his face for a long time as Ariel studied him, only just noticing the gauntness of his thin face, the deep, bruise-like circles under his eyes. If he didn't wear the same thing every day, she might've thought that he hadn't even changed clothes from last night.

"Give me your hand." he ordered suddenly.

Ariel immediately put both of hers behind her back. "Why?"

"I'm cutting it off as penance from scheming."

She held out her hand hesitantly and he took it — surprisingly gentle. Snape cradled it in his own while his other hand raised his wand, golden sparks trickling into her palm. He murmured something fast and smooth under his breath, like a lullaby. It didn't feel like anything until he finished, a warmth pulsing through her hand and up her arm.

Ariel cocked her head up at him as he tucked his wand back into his sleeve. "What'd you do?"

"You lamented last night that we do not speak as often as we should." he glared at her pointedly. "You'll be able to enter my quarters now, whether or not I am there. That does not include my classroom or storeroom."

Ariel was stunned. "O-kay. Why?"

"Did I stutter?" he snapped.

"No, Merlin, I just —" she shook her head, struggling to find the right words. "They're your quarters."

Snape pinched the bridge of his nose. "Why is this so difficult to grasp?"

"Where you live." she gaped. "Why?"

He stared at her, his face twisted in bewilderment and maybe concern — if he was capable of it. Ariel would've thought the world was ending if Snape showed anything other than his usual Hatred for Everyone.

"Because of our…" he clenched his jaw like he was chewing on glass. "Relation."

Ariel felt her stomach give a squirm of happiness. It bubbled up inside her like a balloon, rising higher and higher until it reached her heart.

She grinned, then. "Because I'm your kid."

He made a strange sound, like a growl had gotten stuck in his windpipe. "That took you an alarming amount of time to figure out."

"Right, because you're so happy about it." she rolled her eyes.

"It's out of an abundance of caution." his lip curled. "If you hear anything, you go there and call me with the coin. Am I clear?"

She nodded her head jerkily, staring down at her hand. She flexed her fingers, the tingle of magic lingering at the tips.

"Has there been anything," Snape's eyes shifted from side to side. "otherwise?"

Ariel shook her head. "I haven't heard anything. What happened to Mrs Norris? Will she be okay?"

"The Headmaster is looking into it."

"Does he know about —"

"He's been made aware of everything." he interrupted curtly. "Have I?"

Ariel shifted uncomfortably. Well, I'm going to need to steal from your private stores and I'm eighty-seven percent sure that what I heard last night was Slytherin's monster, and my nightmares are back —

"I've told you everything you need to know." she reassured him.

He growled, giving the writing on the wall a scathing look before he nudged her ahead of him. "Lunch — now. You're not to wander anywhere unaccompanied, am I clear? And I will know, Miss Evans. Any sort of rule-breaking —"

"And you'll end my existence, I know, I know." Ariel rolled her eyes. "Gee, who would've thought that being your kid would —"

He cut her off when he grabbed her by the shoulder and gave her a violent shake. Something wild and desperate had settled in his eyes, sinking down into the pit of Ariel's sternum.

"Being my child means that if you go after that voice again," his voice was winter, unforgiving, and biting. "I will give you something to fear."

As you wish

Ariel lifted her chin and met his eyes. "Do you promise?"

The sneer that twisted his lips didn't reach his eyes. His hand lifted, just beside her face, hovering. She thought he was going to touch her when his hand seized, like he'd been zapped with electricity — or magic — and stalked away without another word.

You don't want the answer to that

"Boy, do I." she said to herself, and followed after him.

A/N: Two chapters in one week?! Completely unheard of…

I'd like to have the next chapter up on Saturday, but please be aware that I will probably not be posting in March at all. My goal is to post at least once a month until I finish my degree in May, so I'm trying to make up for my weekends being eaten up in March by Real Life stuff by pushing out a lot this week, while I'm off.

If I haven't said this, going to school and working full time SUCKS.

Anyway, hope you enjoyed the chapter, reviews are loved and appreciated, and until next time!