Albus Dumbledore was a troubled wizard. He smiled softly as he watched Poppy Pomfrey cast diagnostic spells over the cut, bruised, and magically exhausted Boy Who Lived and the equally battered but not quite as magically depleted or, sadly, unconscious Neville Longbottom.
Lucius Malfoy had reached out to Minister for Magic Crouch because Harry Potter had attempted to murder his son and heir in the middle of the Great Hall and needed to be in Azkaban before he woke up. Minister for Magic Crouch had the very greatest respect for Lord Malfoy, as he owed his political ascension to him, and most of his actual noteworthy accomplishments had required discrete financial assistance or favours from Lucius many contacts. Crouch didn't think he was corrupt, he was a man of great moral character is his own mind, but his dependence on his very dear friend and strongest ally surely required certain flexibility in laws that got in the way of the very real and urgent need to keep wizarding Britain safely at peace, and assured that the Ministry was very firmly in charge.
Cornelius Fudge had put his best man in charge of the investigation of the petrifications at Hogwarts, Auror Dawlish. Dawlish had been Lucius own recommendations, an ex-Slytherin protege of former chief Auror Rufus Scrimgeour, he had come up through the ranks as both successful and discrete when the strict letter of the law could have far reaching and damaging consequences to the public order.
Mad Eye Moody was a menace! His adherence to the letter of the law, no matter who the target was, had more than once resulted in a scandal that had threatened the government itself. Auror Dawlish was much more reasonable, and understood that sometimes the greater good of society required some minor injustices slide, that good order was not just kept, but seen to be kept.
Cornelius Fudge had Floo'd into Dumbledore's office to have a quiet word with Dumbledore to leave the investigation into the use of unforgiveable curses and the disapearance of the Malfoy heir in an unauthorized magical duel to Auror Dawlish.
All plans Fudge had of sweeping this quietly under the rug, with that little mudblood who was already in custody, or that doccumented murderess who had assasinated her way into the Selwyn title, and leave the Boy Who Lived under some very safe ministry oaths of obedience, lest he follow them to Azkaban, and of course the very great favour the Longbottom House would owe him for keeping Neville out of it failed due to Hufflepuff, Hufflepuffing.
Susan Bones, a Hufflepuff of Harry and Neville's years had seen the whole duel and owled Amelia Bones, head of the DMLE before Dawlish could be summoned from his post in the Dungeon to brow beat Dumbledore into an owl ban to lock down news of the event.
Susan had, as any good Hufflepuff, activated her list, and every one of her friends, acquaintances, associates had done the same. The air had been so thick with Owls when Cornelius Floo'd in that he honestly thought it was snowing.
By the time Dawlish had left Albus Dumbledore's office with a quiet assurance that he was, quite unofficially, in charge of the investigation, Amelia Bones had already dispatched Mad Eye Moody, with Kingsley Shacklebolt's own quick reaction team to take rather more official charge.
Albus Dumbledore now had two sets of Aurors, one answering to the head of the DMLE and one to the Minister of Magic from his own protective detail, glaring at each other and stalking the halls of his school.
His own teachers were close to mutiny over Albus Dumbledore's refusal to accept that Draco Malfoy was the Heir of Slytherin, and thus responsible for releasing a Basilisk upon the students of Hogwarts.
Albus had the ghosts and portraits of Hogwarts under his direct control. If something as large as a basilisk was moving through the halls of Hogwarts he would know about it. He had access to the very wards worked into the stone of the castle, and several layers of spellwork beyond anything taught in these halls that were woven beneath the wards, magics far more ancient than the wand based lore of post separation wizard traditions. There is no way any basilisk from outside could have been brought into Hogwarts without his knowledge, and there is no way a basilisk could have survived from the time of the founders.
No. Albus had the previous Headmaster portraits of every professor since the technology for making soul echo portraits had been discovered, barely two hundred years after the founding of Hogwarts, and they all agreed. No such secret chamber existed, and no basilisk had ever been sighted within the walls.
Whatever was being done, was being done by a wizarad. Tom Riddle had been the second strongest dark wizard that Dumbledore had ever met, and his possession of the parseltongue gift and its parselmagic had offered him access to magics that had been better off forgotten, and whose effects could do things that normal magic could not. Dumbledore remembered explaing to Tom Riddle when he was Head Boy that if the petrifications did not stop, since the death of young Myrtle, the school would close and he would be returned to the muggle orphanage for another year without magic.
He never knew how Tom had done it, but the petrifications stopped when he was faced with going back to the muggle orphanage. When he rose to power, he never used the petrification magic again, preferring to kill in any number of grotesque and barbaric ways, unless he wished to simply overawe with the unstoppable killing curse, but Dumbledore never forgot that Tom used petrifications to build fear and establish his legend as the Heir of Slytherin.
What troubled Dumbledore was his own personal nightmare. What if the true Heir of Slytherin was young Harry Potter? The idea that it was Draco Malfoy was ludicrous. Lucius Malfoy was a skilled wizard, but no where near powerful enough to summon and control Fiendfire, and had no familial history of Parseltongue.
Narcissa Malfoy ne Black was different. The Black family had not produced a Parselmouth in generations, but they hadn't produced a metamorphmagus in generations either until young Nymphadora Tonks. The idea that Parselmouth still slept in the Black blood was not impossible. That it might have been triggered by contact with one of Voldemort's Horcrux was also possible, but in no way would that make Draco Malfoy powerful enough as a second year of no particular distinction, to summon or control Fiendfire.
Harry Potter on the other hand.
Harry was a Hufflepuff and as social as any of that breed. He was hard working and excelled at magic beyond his years. Like his companions, he was far stronger since whatever rituals they had practiced, than any second year had any right to be. He commanded magics that Dumbledore did not understand, nor could his spells and wards entirely contain and track.
His closest followers proudly bore his marks. Bright goblin siver runes worked into their skins, using powers that did not require their wands and did not show on the trace or on testing of their wands.
Dumbledore had seen this before. A promising young Tom Riddle had marked his followers with a mark that gave them access to magics that Dumbledore to this day could not understand or duplicate. Magics based in the parselmagic Tom used to base his claim on the Slytherin heirship.
Albus Dumbledore looked at the sleeping Harry Potter and remembered the prophesy that he had hung his hopes on.
"The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches... Born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies... and the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not... and either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives..."
Dumbledore recited the prophesy in his mind. Dumbledore knew that Voldemort had made a mistake. Lilly's sacrifice had skewed Voldemort's final Horcrux attempt to accidentally make Harry the final Horcrux.
For the last ten years, Dumbledore had prepared. He would find and destroy the Horcrux when Voldemort returned again, and engineer a meeting where Voldemort would again try to end Harry Potter, unknowingly killing not only the boy, but himself as his final Horcrux, his final anchor to life died with Harry.
The scar marked Harry as his equal. Dumbledore knew that, trusted that. Trusted that right up until a twelve year old boy reached out and told a Fiendfire basilisk powerful enough to kill every student and professor in the great hall, even in the heart of the Hogwarts defenses, to go take a nap, and it obeyed.
Milicent Bulstrode, one of Harry's followers simply touched Lord Selwyn's Dark Mark and he was reduced to dust and ash. Neville Longbottom simply walked into St Mungos, the most heavily warded institution in Wizarding Britain against dark magic and told his mother and father, wrapped in more binding and preserving magic than prisoners under active Auror interrogation, to die and they simply did.
Dumbledore had watched as Tom Riddle gathered his Death Eaters, marked them, trained them, but he had not understood what he had been watching until they brought wizarding Britain to its knees against all his best efforts until Harry Potter stopped Voldemort himself from his crib.
Dumbledore had bet his soul, his life, and his legacy on Harry Potter being the key to end Voldemort, the Dark Lord he had let rise on his watch, under his very nose. Harry Potter would redeem his sins of innaction with one last, tragic, sacrifice.
Why now did he fear that he had once again missed the rise of a Dark Lord. He had loved Gellert Grindelwald. He had shared his vision and dream until the duel that cost him his precious sister. He never dreamed the cost the world would pay to stop Gellert, and in the end could not even bring himself to kill his love. He had seen the angry and hurt orphan Tom Riddle grow and mature, twist and transform into a Dark Lord of lesser vision and greater danger, and failed to stop him when he was still weak enough to be stopped.
Was Harry Potter the last sacrifice and salvation of the light, or the next Dark Lord rising right under Dumbledore's nose.
The lie about the Chamber of Secrets, this nonesense about a basilisk. Dumbledore knew them to be lies from Tom Riddles day. He was Headmaster of Hogwarts. Only the Founders had access to the castle beyond him, and they were many centuries dead and best forgotten. Needs today were more complex, more political than their limited vision and simpler times allowed.
There was Rowena Ravenclaws Room of Requirement, he knew about that. He had even discovered it one time his muggle chocolate experiment turned out to be something called a 'laxitive' and he needed a bathroom in a hurry. When the Chamber of Secrets nonsense happened last time, he checked that room and found it could not be configured to allow a basilisk entry to the school. He had questioned the House Elves who had access to things and places in Hogwarts even the professors did not, but they did not know of any Chamber of Secrets.
Harry and his friends claimed to have found it. Tom claimed to have found it. Tom lied. Tom did the paralyzing and killing last time. This time, was it Harry and his friends that were doing it? Was it someone of Tom's, some Death Eater who had infiltrated as Draco Malfoy? It shouldn't be possible, but that Dark Mark had defied Dumbledore's detection before.
He wish he knew. Harry was the salvation of the light, and Dumbledore was the Light's Champion, chosen and destined to wield that last precious weapon, that last sacrifice to save the world. He could not allow Harry to be corrupted. He could not allow Harry to become like Tom. If his friends were the cause, then perhaps they too must be sacrificed.
Dumbledore felt tears coming on. He patted Harry's leg.
"My dear boy. I am so sorry." Dumbledore said, and he meant it.
Dumbledore would weep for everything that Harry had to suffer, and for everything that Harry had to lose, but it was for his own good. For the greater good of all wizarding Britain. Dumbledore had come too far, paid too much, for it to all be lost now.
Mad Eye Moody barked a laugh from where he sat watching the beds and the door to the infirmary both.
"Sorry for what? Sorry that the boys did your job and dealt with that junior Death Eater garbage Malfoy? Sorry that there were witnesses? Sorry the DMLE showed up before you let Crouch send Lucius paid dogs to sweep these kids under the table so the world doesn't get to see how the third Malfoy in a row gets away with treason?" Moody barked.
"Alastor, that is hardly fair. Draco Malfoy is not a Death Eater, and his father was acquitted before the Wizagamot of the charge of being a Death Eater." Dumbledore said in the gentle tones of a correcting parent.
Moody nodded and stroked his chin. "Right, right. Acquitted due to the transcript of Sirius Black's secret trial, along with Lord Selwyn among others. All the accused Death Eaters not actually caught in the act who happened to be both wellborn and rich. Funny how only the poor ones turned out to be guilty."
"Here is the thing Albus. I arrested Black. He had no Dark Mark. He was too battered by the explosion that blew up Pettigrew and those muggles to be questioned at the time, but I checked him. He had no Dark Mark.
I also saw the murder victim, Peter Pettigrew when Potter's pet got him for peeking on underage girls in the shower. Pettigrew was very much alive for the last decade Sirius was in prison for murdering him. Pettigrew had the Dark Mark. Isn't that funny Albus?"
Dumbledore said nothing, his face going unreadable and his own Occulmency skills stopping Mad Eyes probe like it hit the stones of Hogwarts own ramparts. Mad Eye grinned.
"What is funnier, is that for all Sirius confession transcrips featured in the trial and exoneration of all those rich pure blood bastards caught with the Dark Mark, when I look for records of the actual trial, they don't exist." Mad Eye said coldly.
Dumbledore made a placating gesture.
"Now now Alastor, many things were classified from that time. I have seen the trial records as Supreme Mugwump. Everything was in order. Even as Chief Auror, some is beyond your level." Dumbledore said with confidence.
Mad Eye grinned. "Gotcha, Albus. That was a mistake. I am recording this you know."
Mad Eye tapped his artificial eye and winked the good one. "Muggles have the greatest ideas. Saw this series of muggle films, James Bond or some such. So many amazing gadgets. Muggles can't do them for real, but wizards can Albus. Who says Muggle studies is a joke elective?"
Moody continued happily.
"Amelia Bones, head of the DMLE authorized me to look into the trial details, and while it is possible for the Minister of Magic himself to seal the records, the sealed records I requested would still be sent to Amelia Bones as head of the DMLE for her inspection and a redacted copy of the information needed for my investigation would be forwarded to me.
Do you know what Albus? There is no record of Lord Sirius Orion Black, Heir of the House of Black ever receiving a trial. When his grandfather died and Lord Sirius Orion Black, neverhaving been convicted of any crime, became Lord Sirius Orion Black, head of House Black, a notice was sent to you as Supreme Mugwump, but somehow never entered into the Wizagamot record. Somehow Lucius Malfoy is voting its proxy, even though no such proxy was ever filed or seen and the Lord of that house still lives and has never been convicted of any crime that would strip him of his voting rights."
Moody turned and pointed to Harry Potter.
"Sirius Black was Harry's godfather. He was set up after young Neville's parents Frank and Alice, to be Harry's guardian, and yet somehow you end up his magical guardian, and he ends up in some Muggle hell hole with relatives that treat him like a House Elf, while somehow you cast the Potter vote in the Wizagamot. Again, with no signed proxy available for examination."
Moody turned and pointed to Dumbledore.
"When I asked Gringotts bank about the Potter accounts, they tell me that you have attempted several times to use your self-appointed status as Harry's magical guardian to seize his vaults and properties, and only failed because Gringotts is under Goblin law and Griphook defends his son's property with the last drop of blood, preferably from a wizard."
Dumbledore shook his head. "I was only looking out for Harry's best interests. He has been raised outside our world and our culture. He has been corrupted by the Goblins and lacks the understanding to make sound choices in our world."
Moody smiled like a shark. "Being raised by Sirius Black, raised himself by Charlus Potter from about Harry's age, would only give Harry the same training and morality his own father received growing up, but you made sure that didn't happen. Funny, you have been advised again and again he is in prison illegally, and as Supreme Mugwump you could have had him release with a wave of your wand or flick of your quill, yet even now you do nothing, or actively interfere. Why Albus?"
Dumbledore's eyes went cold and he stopped pretending to be the kindly grandfather.
"The Boy Who Lived will not be tainted by the dark magics of the Black Family. I will not replace one Dark Lord with another."
Dumbledore said, and the magic of the room beat on Alastor like a heavy rain, but the old Auror was unmoved.
"When the children are ready, they will take me and a team of Aurors to the Chamber of Secrets to find and arrest Draco Malfoy for using the Killing Curse against a living wizard. We will find whatever he has been using for his petrifications, and we will deal with it." Moody stated coldly.
Dumbledore smiled. "Unfortunately, I have ordered all of them placed in protective custody in the dungeons. For the crimes of involvement in a potentially lethal and unsanctioned duel, and for the use of forbidden Parselmagic."
Moody looked at him with his good eye.
"Parselmagic isn't illegal Albus. It's a major branch of healing magic in India and America, and the Chinese Imperial family all have it. The ICW has never banned it, and even in Britain it didn't have a bad reputation until Voldemort. Your good friend Grindelwald managed to butcher half a generation in Europe without using it, or even having it. Besides it's a type of family magic, the sort of inheritance that sets the Ancient and Noble Houses above everyone else and supposedly gives them the right to sit in the Wizagamot. You don't get to make family gifts illegal." Moody grumbled at his former leader.
Dumbledore drew himself up, and the magic of the room gathered about him like a cloak of light that wreathed him in glory too bright to look upon.
"I am the Headmaster of Hogwarts, and what I say is forbidden is forbidden." He said and the stones of the castle shook at the thunder in his words.
He finished in a calm even tone, as if he had not just done his best to overawe the old Auror with the display of near godlike power.
"There will be no further use of Parselmagic inside Hogwarts, nor by any student of Hogwarts outside these walls." Dumbledore said firmly.
"I will not permit another Dark Lord to rise on my watch." He said piously.
Mad Eye blinked his flesh eye to get his sight back from the blazing corona of the Light's Champion briefly unveiled. He was, however, still unmoved.
"I will get an order from the Wizagamot if I have to. Those children say they can open the Chamber of Secrets with their little snake speak trick, and find the hiding place of that junior Death Eater Malfoy. Even you have to let us have them when you get that order. Headmaster or not, Hogwarts is still in wizarding Britain and half a dozen Wizagamot members have bloody children stiff as a board in this infirmary waiting to get unpetrified. Half the rest of them are waiting to find out if their child is next. You will lose this one Albus." Moody insisted.
Dumbledore smiled. Alastor thought his constant vigilance made him the one who saw what others didn't. This was Hogwarts, and Dumbledore had the wisdom of every Headmaster since two centuries after founding, he had the vision of every portrait and ghost, loyalty of every House Elf in the castle. He knew there was no Chamber of Secrets. There was no basilisk. There was only a dark wizard with dark serpent magic. If it was not Harry getting corrupted by the dark magics of the goblins and covens, then it was some Death Eater disguised as Draco Malfoy who had infiltrated the castle. The Headmaster had used his own magics and Hogwarts magic to assure himself Draco Malfoy was no longer in Hogwarts.
With the four children locked up, the petrifications would end. There would be no more of this basilisk nonsense. The Aurors would find wherever Draco ran off to, or whoever was imitating him would be caught. Say what you will about Lucius Malfoy, he would spend however much gold it took to recover his heir, and there was not a criminal enterprise in all of England he did not own or have influence over either. No one would be able to hide from both Malfoy and the Aurors.
All Albus had to do was stall Moody and Bones.
Harry must be pried loose from Dark influences, pried loose from dangerous supporters who offered him enough freedom of action to make wrong choices. Harry was the child of prophesy, but only Albus Dumbledore had the wisdom to make sure the prophesy played out in such a way that Voldemort and Harry both died. Well meaning interference could only lead to a future in which Harry died, and Voldemort yet lived.
For the Greater Good, Harry must be kept isolated and dependent. Harry must not have the freedom to choose wrong, or the slim ray of hope the prophesy offered would fail, and Voldemort would shatter the wizarding world again, leaving too few pieces to ever rebuild.
Moody left by Floo to the Ministry to start the process of getting the Wizagamot order in council to free Harry, Hermione, Neville and Milicent to aid the Aurors in entering the Chamber of Secrets and either rescuing or arresting Draco Malfoy (depending on if that was the real Draco or an imposter).
Auror Dawlish on the other hand, had his best day ever. He had Hermione, Neville, Bulstrode and even Potter under his guard. He quite expected a rather large donation of galleons to arrive at his Gringotts account and a subtly worded expression about the health of one or more of the youths. Whichever or all of them that Lord Malfoy would wonder at the health of would mysteriously die in the cells. It was an unfortunate truth of the wizarding world that those who attempted to testify against the Heads or Heirs of Ancient and Noble Houses very often died of mysterious causes while awaiting testifying.
Minister of Magic Crouch had been very worried that these children were in danger of exposing scandals dating back to the end of the war that could imperil the balance of power in the Wizagamot, and could threaten to not only bring the sitting government down but bring the country back to the bad old days of open fighting in the streets.
It takes quite a bit of gold to buy one such accident. Quite a bit more to buy one that covered a sitting Selwyn Lord, and the Heir Longbottom. Quite a bit more than that to make the Boy Who Lived into the Boy who lived until just now.
Lucius Malfoy had quite a bit more gold, and Auror Dawlish was quite happy to find out how much buying the way out of the hole young Draco so very publicly dug for himself would cost.
Dumbledore had brought Harry, Neville, and Bulstrode down himself, and had Dawlish seal them in. Dumbledore had demanded they be stuck behind silence wards, that the not be allowed to practice any of the Parseltongue until Dumbledore could find a way to construct an oath he could induce the Potter boy to take to buy his friends freedom in exchange for swearing to never speak or use it again.
Dawlish thought that was fine in theory, but he didn't work for Dumbleore, even in theory. He smiled and nodded, shut the lordly little brats up, and went back to muggle baiting in the grand old tradition with that uppity little muggle born who had given him so much frustration, humiliation, injury, and even forced him to go to sensitivity training.
"Well Miss buck tooth beaver faced mop headed mudblood, it seems you finally have all your little friends down here, but only I get to talk to you, isn't that fun?" Dawlish drawled happily, setting himself on a chair outside her chambers, but able to look in her door's viewing grate.
Hermione looked at the stasis block that held Noodle frozen and frowned again. She knew that Mad Eye Moody and director Bones were not going to let them remain imprisoned. Of course, this same legal process had left an actual house Lord in Azkaban without a trial for almost as long as Hermione had been alive, so that was not terribly reassuring.
The warning from Mad Eye about possibly being murdered in her cell before ever getting her day in court also made her worry as Auror Dawlish was as corrupt as any dirty cop in any of the terrible police drama or mob drama that she watched in the muggle cinema.
Still, she was a Hufflepuff, and the House of Badgers was all about muddling through. She had her friends beside her, that was a plus. She couldn't talk to them, that was a minus. She had a definite threat, with a wand, all fof their wands, and even her pistol which he loved showing off in front of her. That was a minus. It was Auror Dawlish, and she had been making a fool of him all summer. That was a plus. I mean, she had beaten him like a rug all summer long when she wasn't even trying. Now she had nothing else to do but figure out how to beat him again to get out. She smiled. Do what you love, and it hardly feels like work anymore. There was a song about that, she thought.
"Ah Auror Dawlish, your sensitivity training has really done wonders for you. I hope your continued failure to even get me a single demerit for underage magic use all summer didn't make you return any of your bribe money. I can't help but think your continued and abject failures must have really driven down the price it takes to bribe you. Pretty soon you may have to live off your actual salary." Hermione offered with a false sympathy and shudder.
Dawlish drew his wand and pointed it inward, only to hear Hermione laugh as she was out of his line of sight through the tiny door grate.
"Oh do come in Auror Dawlish. After all, you did SO WELL the last time before I had any training or experience at all." Hermione laughed happily, watching Dawlish's wand poke through the door.
She knew if he cast any offensive magic inside the cell, alarms would go off both in Hogwarts to the Headmaster, and his deputy, and to the DMLE. While she wasn't sure Dumbledore would care, McGonagall would not stand for it. Amelia Bones could not be bought or threatened, and her designated attack dog Mad Eye Moody could not even be reasoned with.
If Dawlish could be baited into casting something that was dangerous, even damaging, but not actually immediately deadly, then she would have herself and her friends out of this.
She had proven that leaving any of Dawlish's team to listen to her gossip about his many failures and law violations had threatened his authority even inside his own team, so Dawlish was overseeing her imprisonment personally.
Plus, he hated her. Since they both agreed that neither had anything better to do with their lives right now than irritate, insult, and aggravate the other, they settled into an almost happy period of baiting each other. Hermione reflected that two years ago the idea of insulting someone would be impossible, and the idea of offering disrespect to an authority figure would be worse.
Her belief in justice was even more intense now that she was becoming personally powerful enough to make changes in the world, to both stop abuses, and commit them. She was becoming aware of the living nature of magic, of how witches and wizards had a very sacred role in the world, and they had lost their way, wandering far off from that role when they chose secrecy and survival over stewardship and service.
What Hermione gained was both the humbleness to know that she was very small, in the face of a duty that was almost impossibly large, and the awareness that as she progressed as a witch, every decision she made would have greater and more terrible consequences. Like the Spiderman comics she tried to explain to Neville, who insisted that spiders don't work like that, she believed "with great power comes great responsibility".
Wizarding Britain did not work that way. Those with great power used it trivially, arbitrarily, and mostly badly. Those who had the greatest power often sat back and did nothing at all, while those who had little power went about abusing it freely while those both charged and capable of stopping them did nothing.
Hermione wanted to respect authority. She wanted to obey authority. She wanted to practice the rules as written in the sure and certain knowledge that the system was fair, and justice will win out. She was however, a Hufflepuff. When you found a load of dragon dung in the hallway, each house took a different approach. Slytherin could tell themselves it wasn't their job and pass it by. Gryffindor would look for something dramatic and flashy, rather than productive, and go chase down a dragon. Ravenclaw would examine the dung for the probable species, health and diet of the dragon, make appropriate notes, then review the various alternate routes around the dung. Hufflepuff got a shovel and began to clean it up.
Dawlish was her pile of dung, and she was busy shovelling when she heard the dredful whispering from the walls.
"$ You will kill them all. Kill and eat. You will eat nothing else until those four are dead and eaten. This I command as Heir of Slytherin $"
She could hear the voice, for Parselmouths could hear Parseltongue spoken so softly a muggle microphone would never pick it up. They could also tell who spoke, for your soul was in your voice, and your magic was woven into it.
The voice should have been Draco's but the voice was not. The voice was older, colder, and deeply disturbing. Draco/Riddle was an unstable thing, two souls struggling for one body, with the channels between them not sufficient for what they tried to draw through, but each time Riddle's magic tore through Draco's body, a little less of his soul was able to resist. There was no question, the compulsion woven into the parseltongue command was greater than before.
Before her words had easily been enough, and Harry's had been final. Was that still true. With Harry trapped behind silence charms, would her voice be enough to keep the basilisk from killing?
"$ Speaker has ordered you not to kill. Yellow Haired Prey has no right to command the companion of Slytherin. $" Hermione did her best to hiss in the cold tones of command that Harry used when he went a bit scary with it. She thanked Milicent for all her Slytherin style etiquette lessons, as the difference between speaking to snakes and politicians are largely a matter of degree.
"$ Speaker is Speaker. Speaker has ordered me not to kill. Yellow Haired Prey is not Speaker. $" The basilisk said, sounding almost relieved.
"Here now, cut out that snake stuff or by Merlin's beard I will cut your tongue out. I can give you a bloody potion to grow it back if anyone wants to hear you beg before your sentencing" Dawlish shouted, sounding more than a bit disturbed as while he could not hear Riddle or the basilisk at this range, he could hear Hermione.
"$ I AM THE HEIR OF SLYTHERIN $" Malfoy/Riddle hissed.
Hermione had been baiting Dawlish into an illegal attack all day, and somehow she was not able to switch mental gears fast enough to stop her mouth. She found herself, Morgana preserve her, quoting Perfect Prefect Percy.
"$ You aren't even the Heir Weasley. Do not ask for what you cannot take. $" Hermione said, adding one of those little Slytherin quotes that Milicent was always using to underscore her many problems with Hufflepuff solutions and decisions. If you want to insult a Slytherin, you can't go wrong by quoting Slytherin.
"$ I will take you myself. You will beg the basilisk to kill you before I am done. Your bones will lie in the Chamber of Secrets. $" Malfoy/Riddle hissed and this time Hermione heard it like it sounded from right outside the cell.
Because he was.
A black cloud had flowed up the corridor with the speed of a charging horse and condensed into a young and very angry looking Draco Malfoy.
"Well, if it isn't the little Malfoy brat. Your old man will pay through his arse for your otherwise worthless hide. Hand over the wand boy, and I will pack you off to his custody until your daddy's lawyers can bribe you out of this." Dawlish said the light of paydays gleaming in his eyes.
His reflexes were no joke. Auror Dawlish may have had several moral failings that had largely grown from the utter futility of trying to remain honest as an Auror in a society in which the trials are conducted by the chamber whose members are the ones committing the crimes. He was corrupt because he gave up bothering to try when the system was so deeply rigged that honesty was just a great way to remain poor while those above you drank at the teat of gold. He was however, one of the best Aurors on the force.
When Draco Malfoy's wand came up, and the blood boiling curse was the wand movement that the Malfoy brat made, Dawlish already had his best Protego Maximo shield up in front of him. Dawlish did not understand the hissing that came from Malfoy's mouth because the only people who had ever crossed wands with Voldemort using parselmagic and lived were Dumbledore, Harry Potter, and Alastor Moody. Any of those worthies could have told Dawlish that his shield would not even slow down a parselmagic curse. It would strike his chest and his blood would boil, cooking his organs and leaving him to die screaming in agony at Riddle/Malfoy's feet.
Hermione had no wand, her wandless magic was not capable of moving Dawlish even a few inches, let alone clear of the curse. Her magic was trapped behind the wards of the door, and only the small window grate was open to watch Dawlish die in ignorance.
Hermione was a Hufflepuff. She had to try. Slamming her left hand into the grate she felt her ring finger break, but she got two fingers out past the wards and a flash of raw elemental fire blasted at Dawlish's face from the door.
The reflexes of a combat trained Auror are something that have to be seen to be believed. Dawlish didn't just flinch, he threw himself aside, and as he did, the blood boiling curse caught only his left forearm.
It was enough to take him out, but not kill him. The pain and shock from having all the blood in his left arm boil, and his veins, arteries and capilliaries explode was enough to send him into trembling wide eyed and helpless shock. Had it struck his torso, as it was intended when it passed through Dawlish's shield unhindered, he would have been killed, not incapacitated.
Draco/Riddle snarled. "I am so sick of your muggle born meddling interfering with my ascension. I am the true Heir of Slytherin, and you are entirely the filth I am here to clean up. I will drag you down into the chambers, and force the basilisk to kill you. I will not be challenged. I will prove my right to be Heir, and yours will be the first death of my second rise!"
Dawlish heard all that, and it would be days of processing before he understood all of what it meant. His body was too shattered to do more than moan as Draco/Riddle pointed his wand at the door and didn't bother opening it.
"Reducto!" Draco cast, shattering the door and triggering dozens of alarms.
"Accio Mudblood" Draco snarled, and Hermione flew from where the explosion had thrown her to fall on top of Dawlish.
Hermione's right hand flashed for the confiscated wands tucked into Dawlish's belt, and Draco simply laughed lightly and cast a second summoning spell.
"Accio wands" Draco said, letting the wands clatter in a heap about his feet.
Dawlish felt, rather than saw the little muggleborn slip out the Walther PPK from his pocket and into her back holster. His eyes widened. Wizard clothing was enchanted to be impervious to muggle bullets. Even a mudblood like her should realize you cannot simply shoot a wizard unless he was caught naked or in muggle clothes.
"Incarcerous" Draco/Riddle offered happily, wrapping Hermione up.
"Levicorpus" He sneered, bringing her to hover face down above Dawlish so he could see the fear in her eyes as Draco took his time on the last curse.
"Crucio" Riddle/Malfoy laughed as Dawlish heard Hermione scream and watched the forbidden torture curse play out over her body. He had endured it once in training but he watched the Malfoy child casually cast it on her half a dozen times as he slowly rotated her in midair like a pig roasting over a fire.
"You will beg the basilisk to kill you mudblood. You will be the one that betrays all your kind to the gaze of my serpent, and when I open the chamber again, Hogwarts will be cleansed" Whatever now occupied the body of Draco Malfoy laughed long and loud as Dawlish realize that no child of his age could possibly have enough power or hatred to manage what the Malfoy heir was doing right in front of him.
He heard the sound of approaching feet, as the alarms of the blasted doors and unforgiveable curses brought Aurors and Professor McGonagall charging down to investigate.
Dawlish saw Malfoy casually slice the cheek of the Mudblood girl, and with his wand tip and her blood trace something on the wall.
"Her bones will lie in the Chamber of Secrets"
Draco and the girl vanished in the Death Eater smoky transport spell as McGonagall and the rest of his team raced up to see a helpless and soon to be one armed Dawlish weeping helplessly as he lay alone and broken before the empty cell he had been guarding.