Chapter 24, everybody! And I missed the last week in September, yes—but I'll be knuckling down on all my active fics this month and hopefully have a goodly chunk for the remainder of the year. :D
In other news: let us wrap up Chamber of Secrets this chapter. :D
Harry Potter © JK Rowling
Jurassic Park © 1993 Steven Spielberg (Ron quotes it)
The news broke about a day and a half later, after Dumbledore had levied the evidence against Mr. Malfoy and Ginny was safely ensconced in the hospital wing and away from prying eyes: Lucius Malfoy had used an innocent first year to smuggle an extremely dark artefact into the school, with said dark artefact being key to the Chamber being opened. The Chamber itself had been opened by Voldemort, nee Tom Riddle, who had used the artefact to manipulate the poor student—who was most certainly not at fault—into opening the Chamber and releasing the monster. The Chamber itself had not yet been discovered, but they were confident that the attacks would now cease.
All this was in the next morning's edition of the Daily Prophet (The Quibbler had suspended production following Luna's attack, but Harry suspected it'd be coming back with a triumphant bang soon).
"'Course, Malfoy will probably get off, claiming he was manipulated too," Ron groused, glaring at the paper. "But between this and the raids discovering other dark artefacts at his house, he's going to be in enough hot water—probably will lose his position on the school board. And Fudge—that's the minister of magic—won't touch him with a ten-foot broomstick now."
Ron was practically glowing as he came to this conclusion, and dug into his breakfast with gusto.
"This is great, then!" Neville agreed, equally excited. "Because it means the attacks will stop, and this Chamber business is over with! And Harry—you can stop hiding now! Everyone will know you're not the heir!"
That would explain the very loud murmuring rippling through the hall.
And while yes, Harry did feel somewhat better about having solved the mystery, he also felt terrible for one person in particular, who by all accounts he shouldn't feel that way about.
It didn't take too long to find the silvery head of Draco Malfoy, who was turning all sorts of interesting colors while reading the paper—and getting pointed whispers and stares now.
"I…have something to do later," Harry said.
It took a few tries before Harry finally achieved his goal—it had taken both Snips and the invisibility cloak to do it, but he managed to get Draco Malfoy alone.
"What, Potter?" Draco spat. "Come to gloat?"
"It's not my style," Harry told him, before handing him a book. "I wanted to give you this—as a loan."
Draco took the book, confused—eyebrows knitting in a mix of that and anger. "Glamours for All Occasions? Why would I want that?"
"Because I've been where you're about to be, and I know it isn't fun—tell the teachers, ask Flitwick or McGonagall or Slughorn for help. They'll let you sit in their office and do homework—that's what I did."
Malfoy was decidedly confused now. "Why are you doing this?"
"Because I spent all year being the center of angry attention—and I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy." Push the book back when Malfoy stiff-armed it out. "Slytherins are cunning and ambitious, right? So they accept help when it suits them. But Gryffindors are loyal, and they offer help when they need to. Trust me, a glamour is better than breaking down crying after your soup explodes on you." Hesitate. "And you can still be awful to me the rest of the year—I know you like that, for some reason."
Malfoy's expression was a mix of emotions he wasn't wanting to exhibit, judging by the white-knuckle grip he had on the book.
"No one needs to know you got that from me, and you can put a different dust cover on it—actually, hold on," he said, digging into his bag. "Here."
Malfoy didn't take it, still staring at the book.
"Why," he croaked finally. "Why help me?"
"Because it's the right thing to do," Harry insisted. "And because like I said, no one should go through a year like I just had."
Malfoy scrubbed a sleeve across his face—snatched the dust jacket away.
"Your hair is a mess," he managed finally. "And your sweater is revolting." Hesitate. "But thank you."
Harry looked down at his sweater, which had squiggles of every color navigating across a fluctuating neon background. "Thanks," he said, looking back up. "We won't leave at the same time, so no one knows we were in here. Okay?"
Malfoy nodded, hesitated like he wanted to say more—left.
Snips popped up once he was gone.
"That was the right thing to do, wasn't it?" he asked Snips, who considered a moment before nodding decisively. "I thought so too."
Despite things being squared away and Dumbledore assuring them he knew of ways to deal with horcruxes, Harry still felt there were some loose ends to address.
Namely, wherever the Chamber was.
"Come off it, Harry," Ron said. "If You-Know-Who was behind it, and the diary's getting destroyed, then it won't matter, will it?"
"No," Harry said. "But it's still something that needs addressing—and if the Chamber remains undiscovered…then someone could discover it again, use the monster in it. And what if the Chamber is still open? The monster could still be wandering around."
Ron made a noise that was somewhere between disgruntled and agreeing. "But wouldn't you have heard that voice? I thought we agreed that voice was connected to the monster somehow."
"I don't know," Harry admitted. "But if I don't hear it again, it'll be too soon—hearing snakes has been enough trouble."
Hermione suddenly squeaked, her quill flying.
"That's—that's it Harry!" she squawked. "I—there's a book around here somewhere, hold on—"
"Of course there's a book around here," Ron stage-hollered after her, keeping his voice low enough to avoid incurring Madame Pince's wrath. "We're in a library."
Neville blinked after her, looked at them. "Where is she going?"
Ron shrugged, went back to his homework. "You gotta go, you gotta go."
Hermione was back shortly, however.
"I checked this book out first year when we were looking for what Snips was," she explained, depositing the book on the table and flipping through it. "There should be…yes! Here!" Turn the book to face them. "Here it is—this is the monster in the Chamber of Secrets."
Harry and Ron leaned forward, reading….
"A basilisk?" Harry asked.
"More like great big bloody snake," Ron muttered, poking at the book. "Did you see what size this says they get?"
Hermione rolled her eyes. "Read it—it all fits! The dead roosters—the cry of the rooster is fatal to it. The spiders running away—spiders flee before it—"
"But it also says eye contact with it is fatal," Neville read. "No one died. Fortunately."
Harry considered that, looked at Snips, who mimed looking in a—
Mirror.
"No one did look it in the eye," Harry gasped, making the connection as well. "Not directly—Luna had her spectroscopes—you guys haven't worn them, nothing gets seen directly, I'm surprised she could navigate with them. Colin saw it through his camera—Eddie and Justin must have seen it through Nearly-Headless Nick—Nick took the brunt of the attack, but he couldn't die again so—"
"What about Mrs. Norris?" Ron asked. "It's not like she had a camera or glasses or ghosts—"
Harry snapped his fingers, pointed at Ron. "The water on the floor—I bet she saw its reflection."
"But how could it have gotten through the castle?" Neville asked. "I'm pretty sure people would have noticed a giant snake—it doesn't turn invisible, does it?" he asked, paling.
"No," Hermione said. "And any enchantments You-Know-Who would have used on it wouldn't work—magical creatures like that are too powerful. My guess is the pipes—it explains why no one saw it, why Harry kept following the wall when he heard it—why it was only Harry who heard it. Those pipes hiss all the time, it's just background noise for us."
"So a giant snake has been navigating around Hogwarts through the plumbing," Ron said slowly. "I can't think of a single thing about that sentence that isn't horrifying."
"Wait," Harry said, waffling a hand at them. "Everyone keeps saying a student died last time the Chamber was opened—haven't we seen a young ghost? Better yet, a young ghost who died in a bathroom, where there's a lot of plumbing?"
Ron and Hermione looked dumbstruck; Neville just looked confused.
Ron broke first. "You don't mean—not Moaning Myrtle?"
It didn't take very long to present their findings to Dumbledore, who led the charge to Myrtle's bathroom, was very kind and grandfatherly as he gently approached the topic of how she died.
"You see, at the time I entirely neglected to ask," he told her. "But if you would humor an old man's folly—"
He didn't need to sugar-coat it so—Myrtle seemed more than happy to share.
"Oh it was dreadful," she said, launching into a story about how Oliver Hornby had teased her something awful about her glasses, sending her crying into the bathroom, about how she had heard a boy hissing some made-up language—
"So I opened the door to tell him to go away—and I died," she finished happily.
Silence.
"I was kind of expecting a bit more after that buildup," Ron muttered, earning an elbow from Hermione.
"Was that it, Miss Myrtle?" Neville asked.
Myrtle considered. "All I remember when I opened the door was a set of great big yellow eyes—over there," she said, pointing at the bank of sinks. Showed them the general area, the lot of them giving the sinks the once-over—
"I…I think this is a snake on this tap?" Neville said finally. Tried the tap—nothing.
"That one's never worked," Myrtle supplied.
Dumbledore considered it as Harry looked at the tap.
"I must confess that I am not so old that I recall when Hogwarts first got indoor plumbing," he said. "And that I have never before had occasion to use this bathroom. Although I am surprised no one has ever complained about the tap not working."
"Usually people just move on to the next tap."
"Seems a sensible enough action."
"I wonder if you can only get in if you're a Parseltongue," Hermione asked.
"Maybe," Ron said, nudging Harry. "Come on then, give it a go."
"What?" Harry asked, looking at him.
"I'm sorry, Harry," Dumbledore said. "But since you are the only one here who can, there's nothing wrong with trying. If it doesn't work we will simply have to find another means."
"Um…it's just…I don't usually know when I'm doing it…and there kind of has to be a snake…."
As it turned out, Dumbledore was very good at transfiguration, and the soap on the next sink over was soon a small pink snake with tiny flowers on the scales and a faintly lavender scent.
"Uh, hi," Harry said—glanced at Ron, who gave him a thumbs-up.
"You think it's just asking the entrance nicely, or is there a password?" Neville asked.
"Perhaps just asking it to open is a good starting point," Dumbledore offered.
"What's going on?" the snake asked.
"We're just trying to get a door open," Harry told it—
Snakes aren't built for yelping in alarm, so it was pretty impressive when the snake did just that and shot off at the one sink rumbling, then rising—
And then there was a steep sliding tunnel before them.
"Well," Dumbledore announced. "This is promising."
All students were sent back to their dorms as Dumbledore summoned a team of Aurors and Magical Creature Removal specialists, only pausing to ask Harry to say open into a shell, in Parselmouth if you'd please.
"I don't doubt that there is indeed another door that requires opening, but I'd rather not be forced to bring you along into what promises to be a dangerous situation," Dumbledore informed him.
That was fine with Harry, as was sitting in a corner of the common room with his friends as everyone else theorized on just why they had all been sent back to their dorms.
News broke in Ravenclaw and Gryffindor first, only because they could see a blindfolded and subdued basilisk being levitated out of the castle, to later be relocated to an unplottable island somewhere in the Pacific where it could live out its days without doing anyone any harm.
Dumbledore's speech at the surprise feast next day helped to clear up any questions, as well as bolstered spirits when he announced that the petrified students would soon be rejoining them, and that if anyone happens to spot a lavender-scented snake, please send it up to the headmaster's office and do try not to get it wet.
Everyone was in a fine mood, finer when everyone was back to normal (and did indeed confirm that it was a great big bloody snake that did it), Gryffindor especially happy when Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Neville earned a good chunk of house points for figuring out the mystery, we will try to have a less lethal schoolwide mystery next year (although Hermione was disappointed when the final exams were cancelled as a school treat). Luna, of course, happily demanded an interview, one that Harry was only too happy to provide.
Luna also found the lavender-scented snake, which she decided to name Mauve and take home. Apparently that had required a lengthy discussion with Dumbledore and the agreement that it was best that Mauve not get wet and that she probably would have a happier diet on mouse-shaped soap, which Dumbledore helped Luna figure out.
It was actually kind of entertaining watching the two interact, considering they were matching levels of eccentric, and ended with Dumbledore purchasing a subscription to The Quibbler and giving it a glowing recommendation.
Luna reported in her letter to Harry at the beginning of the summer that sales had never been better.