AN: We're back for another week! Hopefully this chapter will tie up a few of the loose ends and answer a few questions people have had. Enjoy!
Harry awoke to find himself once more in one of the beds in Madame Pomfrey's hospital wing, a sight he was quickly becoming both familiar and disgusted with. Not to say that Pomfrey kept the place anything short of immaculate, it was spotless and sanitized from floor to ceiling, but that sanitization gave it a maddening quality. It made the place seem almost inhospitable to life of all kinds, perhaps on purpose to discourage students from creating injuries and maladies to escape from class. Harry was stirred from his thoughts however, by a hand squeezing his.
"Are you awake Harry?" An accented voice asked, looking up, Harry saw Padma, a look of obvious concern, and simultaneous relief on her face.
"I think so. How long was I out?" Harry asked, aware that he had been unconscious. It wouldn't be the first time such a situation had left him missing gaps of time. He could only hope her perhaps missed an hour or so.
"About three days." Padma said. There went that hope out the window. Three days? That was longer than he had been in the hospital wing after his encounter last year with…
Voldemort. He had done this, or at least some shadow of his past self had. The man had cheated death, that much was certain last year, although Harry held on to the hope that perhaps he had managed to vanquish him for good in the room with that mirror. This shade though? The memory, locked in a diary? It didn't give him hope that Voldemort was gone. He could create something like that, something capable of controlling someone, nearly fifty years from it's creation. Something that had enough power to cast its own spells, and command the great Basilisk that Harry noticed had given him a scar on his arm. The shape was not unlike the fang of the snake itself, roughly triangular, and longer than it was wide.
"Did Susan make it out okay?" Harry asked, ashamed that he hadn't asked about her first.
"Magically exhausted, and scared out of her mind, and a few scrapes on her knees, but otherwise perfectly fine. She made a full physical recovery after a day, although she's been doing some counseling with Madame Pomfrey about the experience. She came clean, told Dumbledore, Pomfrey, Sprout, and Flitwick everything, about the diary, it controlling her in the night, your crusade to find the creature, all of it. They hadn't wanted me there, but Susan demanded that I be allowed to stay. I was a part of this, and knew all of it already. Called me a hero for going to save her, although I didn't do much of anything."
"What are you talking about? You did great! How were we supposed to know that Lockhart was lying about more than just exactly how the events in his books went down. The man fooled the entire wizarding world for years, but you Parvati and Lavender were on track to expose him after a few months!" Harry said, trying to make her see her importance. When Padma had mentioned grabbing Lockhart, it had made sense. Even if he seemed kind of foppish and full of himself, he did have a number of great accomplishments to his name, including being honored by one of the premier dueling leagues in Britain. One of Flitwick's earliest lessons in dueling was never to judge an opponent based on their outward appearances, and Flitwick himself had been an excellent example. The diminutive duelist was one of the friendliest kindest people he'd ever met, rivaling even Hagrid in that regard, but on the dueling grounds he was a vicious and ruthless opponent, never giving his opponents an inch to breathe. Harry thought that maybe the flamboyant attire and self importance was a mask hiding a clever duelist, even if perhaps he was exaggerating his accomplishments a bit. Maybe he didn't take down a horde of zombies, and instead fought of a handful. Maybe he hadn't vanquished an entire Yeti den, but had managed to subdue or even kill one. Harry wouldn't fault someone for exaggerating a story a bit to make it more interesting, although in his case it nearly got them killed.
"Speaking of Lockhart, what happened with him?" Harry asked, still trying to assess his situation.
"Turns out he had completely wiped his own memory of himself. He doesn't know who he is, although he seems to be able to recognize certain places and concepts. He's aware of what a wizard is for example, but not that he is a wizard. They took his wand from you while you were out, seeing if they can try to reverse engineer his spell to fix him." Padma said, leaning back in her chair. "After Susan made it to the hospital wing, Amelia Bones and some Aurors showed up to assess the situation. The Ministry had apparently been allowing Hogwarts to solve this problem on its own, but now that it's over, a full investigation into what happened and how it can be avoided in the future is being done."
"Wonder why they didn't do that before." Harry muttered, thinking about how useful an auror or two would have been when he had to fight a Basilisk with a hat and a sword.
"Since there hadn't been any actual deaths, regulations say that Hogwarts has to handle the matter internally. Students get injured through potions accidents and the like often, so the agreement between the Hogwarts Board of Governors and the Ministry of Magic was always that matters of student safety were to be handled by Hogwarts' staff until a death was involved. Last time the chamber was opened, Myrtle died, so the Ministry stepped in and punished Hagrid, but since even then they knew that he hadn't intentionally killed Myrtle, he didn't need to serve any prison time." Padma said. "Your memories will prove that Hagrid was innocent though, so that'll at least be removed from his record."
"Do you think Hagrid will get his wand back?" Harry asked, excited that his oldest friend might be allowed to wield a wand again.
"Unlikely. His old one was snapped, so even if they had the pieces it is more or less unfixable. Since he never finished Hogwarts, he wouldn't be allowed to use any magic anyway. Hagrid will be fine though, he's gone this long without a wand and he's perfectly happy." Padma said. She was right of course, Hagrid certainly wasn't helpless without a wand, and seemed perfectly capable of performing all of his duties without one. That umbrella of his seemed to be a perfectly acceptable substitute anyway.
At that moment, Professor Flitwick, Amelia Bones, and Harry's adoptive mother Andromeda Tonks walked through the door with Madame Pomfrey, Andromeda wasting no time in dashing across the floor and crushing Harry into a hug.
"Harry, I'm so happy you're okay. I was so worried." Andromeda said, as Harry could feel his bones begin to creak under the pressure she was exerting on them. Harry didn't mind though. He was happy to see her again.
"Mr. Potter, it is good to see you well. Madame Bones here wishes to thank you for saving her niece, and then unfortunately we have a few questions that will need to be answered." Flitwick said, nodding to Padma. "Ms. Patil, I will leave your continued presence here to Mr. Potter's discretion."
"She can stay. She was here for all of it barring the end, and was willing to accompany even then, had something else not gotten in the way." Harry said, looking favorably at Padma.
"Alright then. Everyone in this room is of course sworn to secrecy while this investigation is in progress." Amelia Bones said, her tone official, and not the simple, near motherly tone she had taken with Harry in prior interactions. "Wait.. no. I'm not here as the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, I'm here as Susan's Guardian. I just, can't believe she was hurting like this and I didn't notice." Her tone softened, before becoming sad.
"Only Hannah had managed to notice that anything was wrong, and you'd be hard pressed to find anyone who knew Susan more than her. Even Hannah had just thought she was stressed. A lot had happened, and Susan was… keeping everything bottled up." Harry said.
"You seem to know a lot about what's been going on, even how to find the Chamber when none of us had managed to do so. Care to explain?" Flitwick asked. There was no accusation in his voice, there was no way to think that Harry would set all of this up, especially with how injured he had become in the process. It was a miracle he had survived, and if he wasn't the person the most affected, he was high up on the list. His best friends were taken hostage or petrified by the events, himself existing on death's door for several days.
"It started on Halloween. I had heard something, now I know it's the Basilisk, talking about killing something. I'm a Parseltongue, I didn't know what that was before all of this, although I did know I could talk to snakes. That's when we came across Ms. Norris. From there, there was nothing until the attack on Colin Creevey and Nearly-Headless Nick. Susan told us about this diary she had found with her things, and when she wrote it in it, it wrote back. She thought it was just a mild personality enchantment, like the mirrors Padma and Parvati have, and just accepted it as a gift you had given her to help her have a confidant for things she didn't feel comfortable sharing with anyone. That diary turned out to belong to Tom Riddle, a Hogwarts student from the forties who eventually became Voldemort. He had somehow put his consciousness into the diary, and was using it to control Susan. She was worried that if we went to Dumbledore, that she'd be blamed for the attacks, even though she wasn't the one in control of her actions, so we brainstormed how to stop them. We eventually figured out that the monster had to be a Basilisk, and were researching how to deal with them, as well as how it was moving through the castle undetected. Hermione and Luna found out that it was using the expanding pipes to move through the castle, but didn't get to tell us about it before they were petrified. I started trying to track down the Basilisk, not thinking really about what I would do when I found it. Padma, Daphne, and Susan had figured out the last pieces of the puzzle to find where the Chamber was, and when Padma came to tell me, Hannah told us Susan was missing. Then there was the message on the wall that said that she would die in the chamber, and so Padma and I grabbed Professor Lockhart and tried to go and deal with the Basilisk. From there we opened the way to the Chamber, went down, Lockhart tried to wipe our memories and claim to have killed the Basilisk, wiped his own memory by accident, and Padma went to take him away and get help while I went to save Susan. I fought the Basilisk, alongside the memory of Tom Riddle who told me he was Voldemort, and managed to beat them both and save Susan, before passing out and waking up a few minutes ago." Harry said. It wasn't a perfect explanation, but he was past the need to hide any of this information. Whatever happened from this point happened.
"Mr. Potter, I must ask, why not ask me, or one of the other professors for help? You had shown quite a distaste for Professor Lockhart, you've told me as much yourself." Flitwick asked.
"I didn't know that Lockhart was a fraud, just a goofball. You yourself told me not to underestimate someone just because of their appearance or demeanor. I had hoped, although didn't really believe, that his attitude was just an act. Padma, Parvati, and Lavender had apparently worked out he had lied about his accomplishments in a few of his books, and had used that to get him to help us." Harry said, squeezing Padma's hand that had found its way into his own.
"What is this about Gilderoy Lockhart being a fraud?" Amelia Bones asked.
"My sister, Lavender, and I had noticed Harry's lack of confidence in the Professor, and had done some research, hopefully to ease Harry's worries. Tracking Lockhart's appearances at events over the last decade had been easy, given how much he loved publicity. From there we noticed that he was at book signings and public events during times he was supposedly off in other locations. When we went into the chamber, he himself said that he had wiped the memories of noteworthy adventurers, the ones who had done the things he said he did, and then took credit for their stories. Apparently he was a master of the memory erasure charm." Padma said.
"I see. Now I suppose the question is how did Susan get the diary in the first place? I certainly didn't give it to her." Amelia asked, not expecting any answer.
"I think I know actually." Harry said, trying to sit up more in his bed. "Before this school year I was visited by a House Elf named Dobby, who was trying to convince me that it wasn't safe for me to return to Hogwarts this year. Mom had told me about them when we first encountered Dobby, and they're mostly used by wealthier families, like the Blacks. Mom didn't know who Dobby belonged to, but I think I do, and I think all of this was planned. When Susan, Hermione, Hannah and I went shopping, Lucius Malfoy gave Susan a book on advanced transfiguration. I think that Lucius had transfigured the diary to hide it in the pages of that book, and had the spell end after Susan had already packed her things for school, so you never had the chance to see it. Then the diary would take over her, and cause her to do those things. As for why he would do that, I'm afraid I don't know." Harry said, laying out the pieces as he had connected them.
"I can think of a number of reasons Lucius Malfoy might want to see harm come to me or my family. I've been opposed to many of his anti-muggleborn policies for years, he might have been trying to devastated me with the loss of Susan. She's the only family I have left." Amelia said. "The speculation is good, but I don't think it'll be enough to connect Malfoy to this, especially since the only investigation I would be allowed to do with this is looking into Lockhart's memory erasure."
"It is unfortunate that Headmaster Dumbledore is not allowing anyone to look into the incident more, although I suppose word being out about some aspect of Voldemort surviving would cause some panic." Flitwick said. Harry merely looked upset that nothing would be done to Lucius for his actions in this.
"Yes, although I suppose it might also be because of how he would need to do so, for him to give the approval would need to be ratified by the Board of Governors as well, and given that Malfoy is the chairman, all asking them would do is let Malfoy know we want to look into it." Amelia said.
"It's a shame my sister married that foul man." Andromeda said, looking furiously at the far wall, as though she could see Lucius behind it.
"For now, we will need to keep the details of this conversation quiet, at least as it pertains to Lucius Malfoy." Amelia said, looking to everyone in the room. "Harry, thank you so much for saving my dear Susan. I don't want to even think of what might have happened if you hadn't been there to save her."
"You're welcome Madam Bones, but it's really no problem. Susan's special to me too, I couldn't bear to see her hurt either." Harry said, unsure of whether or not he should mention that he is dating Susan. Especially given bothe Padma and Andromeda are here. Talking about dating a girl with his mom nearby? That's embarrassing. He'll need to talk to Nym first, figure out what he's going to do about this. The legal aspect of dating, and eventually marrying multiple girls was something he had been prepared for, Mr. Patil had provided him with plenty of information on that through the manuals on being a sole heir to a noble family. The practical and emotional aspects though? Harry was clueless. It wasn't even that long ago that the mere thought of holding one of the girls hands turned him into a tomato. He's still unsure what confidence possessed him when he first kissed Padma, maybe just built up frustration of over a year of teasing. He didn't mind the results though. He truly cared deeply for all five of the girls, and wished they could all be here. He'd make sure to tell them the next time he could.
"What about the others who were petrified, are they free yet? I know the potion they needed was meant to be finished soon." Harry asked as the thought came to his mind.
"Yes, thankfully. All made a full recovery, Ms. Granger and Ms. Lovegood were very concerned about you Harry, especially when they found out you fought a Basilisk by yourself. I imagine you'll have some very angry witches to deal with when you see them." Professor Flitwick said, a small smile gracing his face. Hearing they were awake and moving again was amazing news for Harry, hearing them being upset at him was less so.
"Is it too late to fight the Basilisk again?" Harry asked jokingly. The question had the desired effect, as everyone in the room started laughing. Everyone was safe at the moment, that's what mattered. Harry and Susan had survived. Hermione and Luna were awake. That's what mattered.