Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The relief that accompanied his arrival at the Weasley's household had been indescribable. Harry Potter has been living with his relatives since his parents died at the hands of a dark wizard that called himself Lord Voldemort. They had been unbearable to him since he could remember.

His aunt Petunia, who resembled a horse more than she did a human being, scrunched up her face every time she caught sight of his messy hair. She and her husband, Vernon, lived to attempt to over-shine their neighbours and to feed more food to their already fat son.

Harry hated to live under the same roof as them; where he had to swallow all the lies they made up to explain his existence, to have a minimalistic bedroom and be their personal slave.

His predicament only got worse once his letter arrived on his eleventh birthday, actually addressed to his previous sleeping location — the cupboard under the stairs. A letter from Hogwarts, a school for wizards.

Harry was a wizard, just like his parents had been — a fact his relatives had hid from him until Hagrid, the keeper of the school grounds, tore down a door to take Harry away.

His aunt and uncle called him a 'freak' because of his magical abilities and they made everything in their power to keep him at bay. That summer, their solution had been to lock him inside his bedroom and put bars on his windows.

For a moment there, as he gazed through the thick, black bars, Harry had feared he wouldn't be able to go to school that year. He had thought he wouldn't be able to see his friends again and be very far away from the Dursley's.

He had never been happier when, one night, while his family slept, a flying car hovered by his window and his best friend's voice called for him from outside. Ron Weasley, together with his twin brothers Fred and George, had stolen their father's enchanted car, and they came pick him up.

Harry has been with the Weasleys for two whole weeks now and he has never felt happier. Mrs. Weasley could be a bit unbearable at times, and she did order them all to rid her peonies of Gnomes, but she also showed more care to Harry than anyone has ever done before. She let him eat whatever he wanted and Harry was still fascinated to see magic being used so... mundanely.

He still felt impressed upon entering the kitchen in the morning and seeing dishes washing themselves, and bowls filled to the brim with mashed eggs and toasts floating to the wooden, tipped surface that was the Weasley's table. He still gazed every day at the clock on the wall, containing a moving picture of every Weasley and showing exactly where they were.

Harry woke every day with a smile on his face when his unfocused gaze caught sight of the alarmingly orange walls of Ron's room and his ears thumbed with Ron's snores. For the first time in his life, Harry didn't care much when he was told to do the shores, as he had company.

Today, though, breakfast wasn't filled with Mrs. Weasley yells for Fred and George not to play with their food and with Mr. Weasley inquiring about the Muggle World to Harry. Ginny, Ron's youngest sister, also hadn't just come down the stairs, flushed redder than her hair at the sight of Harry and ran upstairs with a half-eaten piece of toast.

That morning, they were immersed in their respective letters.

Harry read his list carefully, realising that he had the majority of the books already. He would need only some extra set of quills, a few potion ingredients that had run out after his various attempts to pacify his potions Professor with what had been called 'mediocre work' the year before, and textbooks for Defence Against the Dark Arts class.

He frowned upon noticing that all the titles required were written by a certain Gilderoy Lockhart.

Harry turned to the others, wanting to see if he was the only one experiencing mild confusion, when he realised that Mrs. and Mr. Weasley were stiffer than before, holding Ginny's letter in hand.

"This new books won't be the cheapest." Fred remarked from his place, yanking Ron's letter from his hand and skimming through it. "And there is still everything for Ginny."

"No need to worry, dear." Mrs. Weasley said, but Harry remarked that her statement didn't match her slightly quivery tone of voice. "We will figure it out. We always do."

Harry felt a bit out of place then.

He hadn't forgotten that Ron's family financial situation was... complicated. But he honestly thought it wasn't that bad and the mockery he had witnessed in his first year at Hogwarts had been fruit of how bigoted the Slytherins were. Everyone had warned him about the Slytherins, after all.

Hogwarts divided the students into four different Houses. Each of them had an animal to symbolise it, their own colours, their own ghosts... . Turns out they also had their rather unique profile to accept students.

It was said that the Gryffindors, those from the house of the red and gold lion, Harry and all the Weasleys included, were the bravest. Ravenclaws were the wisest, the keepers of knowledge and represented by a raven in a bronze and blue crest. Hufflepuffs were the kindest, the hard workers — even though some said that they just lacked talent to be anywhere else — and identified by the yellow and black robes the students wore and the badger they had in their chests.

The last one were the Slytherins. The snake's House was where all the dark wizards came from. They were all mean and thought themselves superior. They cheated at Quidditch and they were the ones who had snubbed Ron and his family the year before, saying that his family was inferior for being poor.

Harry thought they had been just being their disgusting usual selves, but now he felt bad for imposing his presence at the Weasleys. If they didn't have the money to buy supplies for school, could they afford to have Harry there? Was Harry making it harder for them by eating their food and taking longer showers than he did at home? Did wizards even have to pay for water? Harry knew for a fact that they needed no electricity, so maybe his long showers haven't been such a big problem.

He could certainly hope so.

"I also got a letter from Hermione!" Ron exclaimed from beside him and Harry guessed their other friend probably knew Harry would read the letter too. They had told her Harry was staying with Ron's family. "How many books you recall she has already read this summer, Harry?"

"A thousand -- rounding it down." Harry answered, snickering when Ron did. "What does she want? She couldn't have had time to buy the new material already. I mean — the letters've only just arrived."

Ron nodded along with him.

"She is inviting us to meet her in the Alley today." Ron said, turning to his parents — Mr and Mrs. Weasley were still discussing Ginny's list in hushed tones. "Can we dad? I bet Hermione's parents will be there. They are Muggles, you know?"

"Oh, how splendid." Mr. Weasley peaked up in his sit, ignoring —or simply not noticing — the way his wife huffed at his obvious wrong priorities. "Sure we can. Why don't you children go change upstairs and we may all travel through the Floo network once you are ready."

Floo network?

"Do we have enough Floo powder for everyone, dad?" George asked, a mischief glint shinning in his eyes. "I'm sure Fred and I could take the car. You know, to spare a bit."

Floo powder?

"Absolutely not!" The shrieking tone of Mrs. Weasley's voice almost had Harry cringing and, from the corner of his eyes, he noticed Percy, the third Weasley child, doing just that. "You two won't ever touch that car again and this is the end of the discussion! Now, you heard your father. Everyone should be getting ready if we ought to be back in time for lunch."

As one, they all got up from the table — Ron stealing another piece of cake and swallowing it almost immediately upon pushing it through lips — and Harry followed his friend up the stairs and to the room they were sharing.

"What's this network, Ron?" Harry asked.

"Oh, I forget you were raised by Muggles." Ron commented, crumps flying out of his mouth as he started to take off his mismatched socks. "The Floo is... er... a wizard way of travel, I suppose. You just enter the fireplace and... well, you throw the powder inside and tell it where you wanna go."

"Tell who?"

"The fireplace, of course!" Ron looked at him as if he had grown a second head.

Harry imagined his expression must be mirroring his.

"But... how does the fireplace, you know... understands?" Harry asked, feeling the weirdness of the words that had just left his mouth weighting his tongue and confusing his own brain.

"Because of the network." Ron said so slowly, as if the slow speed of his speech would make it start making any sense. "All fireplaces are connected, Harry."

"So, you just... say the name of the place you want to go, then?"

"Pretty much." Ron said, shaking his head with a disgusted face as he sniffled the armpits of the shirt he wore the day before and then threw it back to the pile of dirty pieces on the corner of the room. "Well, you have to say it very loud and clear, I suppose. Dad reckons there had been some accidents before."

"What kind of accidents?"

"Nothing too serious, mate." Ron reassured him. "Just some old wizards getting stuck on the way or arriving in the wrong place. Nothing too hard to fix."

"How nice." Harry commented dryly, rolling his eyes at the thumbs up Ron sent his way.

Mentally, though, he was repeating the limited set of instructions Ron had given him and wondering what a fireplace considered to be 'loud and clear'.

Harry's conception of 'loud and clear' turned out to be very different from the one of the fireplace.

Harry wound up in a gloomy looking place, dust hovering for seconds around him once his body made contact roughly with the floor. The only source of light was a single ray coming through the permanently dirty glass, and Harry focused his eyes in the small particles glimmering afloat in that unique filet of sunlight.

Harry groaned internally at the broken lenses blurring his left eye and got up.

Looking around, Harry noticed the glass was a vitrine and the place he was in, a store. But it wasn't the cheerily looking stores Harry came to associate with the bursting, colourful Diagon Alley.

For starters, it was completely empty. Not even the owner in sight.

Peering outside, Harry noticed that the street had no movement, but there was a wizard, dressed all in black, leaning against the wall opposite it. The unknown person had their face hidden and, even from a distance, Harry could see that the long object on their hand was no wooden wand. It was a dagger.

Harry was scared of leaving the store. But he was also scared of remaining inside.

Beside the fireplace, there was an imposing looking dark cabinet. Its mere appearance warning others to keep their distance. On the counter — as dirty and dust-covered as the rest of the place — Harry could see a hand, its fingers crooked and its shade grey. He assumed a dead limb would be that same colour and a shiver went up his spine.

On the walls, eyeless masks seemed to stare at him, daring him to come closer and touch it. Harry hid his hands in the fabric of his robes and left them there, apprehensive. Flasks with what he assumed to be blood, nails, eyeballs and even... brains were lined up in shelves and Harry took one step closer to the fireplace as the chains pending from the ceiling — no doubt also enchanted with some dark curse — banged against one another due to an unfeeling breeze.

Another object caught his attention, resting on a regal looking cushion — so in contrast with the mood of the store. It was a glass eye, the light blue orbit staring directly at Harry and, for a moment there, he was afraid that it recognised him.

Harry was looking around for more Floo powder he could use when the bell on top of the front door he hadn't noticed before rang. The owner — whomever he was — was bound to come attend their costumers.

In a desperate act of survival, as Harry highly doubt someone who voluntarily entered that store and asked for bottled fingernails was in any way a standardly good person, he entered the dark cabinet; peering outside from a thin gap he made sure to leave.

Harry needn't hear the voice to pinpoint whom that shade of slick blond hair belonged to.

"You told me we were going to buy my school supplies, father." Draco Malfoy was looking at his father with angry eyes.

Harry felt anger just looking at the other boy, noticing with disdain that his father barely acknowledged him, only pushed him forward.

"Touch nothing, Draco!" Mr. Malfoy hissed to his son.

Draco Malfoy was a Slytherin. He was the one who had mocked Harry and Ron every chance he got; who tried to get them into trouble and whose friendship Harry had rejected his first day at Hogwarts.

From what Fred and George had told Harry, Malfoy was probably the one who sent the crazed House-Elf that got him not only bars on the window, but also a notification from the Ministry. Dobby, the House-Elf, had arrived at his relatives' house the same night that his uncle Vernon was trying to impress his boss and sweet-talk his way into a promotion.

Harry's only task had been to pretend that he didn't exist — and he was usually an expert in that art. Malfoy's idea of a prank, though, was to send the squeaky creature to his house and have said creature causing mayhem until Harry agreed to not go back to Hogwarts.

He bet Malfoy would have the time of his life telling his snake friends that he had made 'Scar-head' stay at home with the Muggles. He would love to have the credit.

Harry wanted nothing more than to leave the cabinet and throw Malfoy inside the fireplace. Maybe he would be one of those who would get stuck in the network. But, from what Fred and George told him, a family had to be very rich to have a House-Elf at their disposal, and the Malfoys happened to be very, very rich. The twins also said that Malfoy's father happened to be a very, very dangerous man.

Harry remained quiet inside the cabinet. Only listening.

"Mr. Malfoy, what a pleasure to see you again." Harry could barely see anything very clearly, but he thought he caught sight of a hair as oily as Snape's. The voice of the owner of the store didn't sound much different. His voice was sticky, overly delighted almost. "And I see you brought young Mr. Malfoy too — charmed. How may I be of assistance this day? I must say, I've received the most —"

"A pleasure as always, Mr. Borgin." Mr. Malfoy interrupted the other man — Mr. Borgin — and Harry didn't think it was a pleasure at all. He could almost feel the grimace that was marring Malfoy's father's angular face. "I'm afraid I'm not seeking to buy today, but sell."

"Selling?" Mr. Borgin sounded highly disappointed.

"You have heard, of course, that the Ministry is proceeding with those obnoxious raids." Harry felt curiosity crawl his away up his body as Mr. Malfoy took a roll of parchment from his breast pocket and held it out for Mr. Borgin to read. Harry noticed that his glove-clad hand never once touched the counter. "I have a few rather questionable items at home that would cause me the most embarrassment if the Ministry were to discover them."

Harry saw Mr. Borgin peering down at the list. There was a crease in his brow.

"The Ministry surely wouldn't presume to trouble you, sir?"

Mr. Malfoy curled his already thin lips, his mouth becoming a line. Harry could have trembled just from the sour expression on his face and the way his hand shifted slightly closer to his can. There was a snake head at the tip, of course.

Harry felt the urge to roll his eyes at the man's erroneous house pride.

"I have not been visited yet. The name Malfoy still commands a certain respect, yet I cannot stop the Ministry from growing continuously more meddlesome. Such raids are a very poorly formulated excuse. No doubt the rumours about a new Muggle Protection Act are entangled with it. That flea-bitten, Muggle-loving fool Arthur Weasley is certainly behind it —"

Harry felt another urge to leave the cabinet. He didn't care how dangerous Mr. Malfoy could be. He and his son would be better off lost in the Floo network.

"As I am sure you can infer from the list I've provided you with" Mr. Malfoy continued "some of this poisons and artefacts might make it appear —"

"Of course, sir. I understand." Mr. Borgin said, "I will see what I can do..."

"What is that?!" Malfoy, who had been so quiet since his entrance on the store that Harry forgot for a second that the other boy was even there, was pointing to the grey hand under the glass of the counter.

Harry noticed that the blond was leaning towards it slightly, hands reaching forwards as if he meant to touch it. He straightened as flat as a broom once his father slapped his across the head, the normally immaculately styled strands falling out of place.

Harry arched an eyebrow as Malfoy glared at his beloved father under his eyelashes.

"Ah, this is the Hand of Glory!" Said Mr. Borgin, momentarily abandoning Mr. Malfoy's list so he could scurry over to Malfoy. "Insert a candle and it gives light only to the holder! Best friend of thieves and plunderers! You have a very fine eye!"

"I do sincerely hope my son will amount to more than a thief or a plunderer, Borgin." Mr. Malfoy said coldly, hand resting maybe a bit too hard on the back of his son's neck.

"No offence, sir. No offence meant..."

"Though," Mr. Malfoy interrupted Mr. Borgin's rushed apology "if his grades don't pick up on the foreseeable future, then maybe such a fate will be his only option."

"Father, —"

"Do not pout, Draco. It is unbecoming." Mr. Malfoy said almost manically, adding almost to himself after "Being bested by a plain girl. Of no wizard family, lesser blood."

"I told you already, father!" Draco snapped. "Granger is not better than me! She just memorises the textbooks and is friends with saint Potter! Dumbledore only gave her those points because —"

"How many times do I have to remind you, Draco," Mr. Malfoy said quietly, voice so low and lips so immobile that Harry had to double check to make sure his imagination wasn't playing tricks on him "that it is not ... prudent — to appear less than fond of Harry Potter? Not when he is regarded as the one responsible for vanishing the Dark Lord. It worries me that you seem unable to understand the most basic of commands. No wonder a ... Muggle-Born is outshining you so thoroughly."

"Ha!" Harry said under his breath, pleased to see Malfoy looking both abashed and angry. Ashamed. He was pleased to see that not even Malfoy's father liked him that much.

"Of course, father." Malfoy mumbled, his gaze once more staring ahead.

"Perhaps you can return to my list, Borgin." Said Mr. Malfoy. "I am in something of a hurry, if you don't mind. I must attend to business elsewhere."

Both grown adults started to bargain and Harry cursed his lack of knowledge about the Wizarding World. He recognised none of the words being repeated — he wouldn't be able to recall them later, if someone asked him. He also had no idea what was expensive and what was cheap to wizard standards, but he doubted Mr. Malfoy was being fair. Mr. Borgin's scowl intensified every time Mr. Malfoy increased the value of one item or another in one Galleon, but Harry assumed that the oily man preferred not to risk being accosted to Mr. Malfoy's bad side.

Mr. Malfoy lead the bargain from the beginning to the end. His voice settling all the last numbers and he was the only one smiling by the end of the negotiations — if one could even call it that.

"Done." Mr. Malfoy said. "Good day to you, Mr. Borgin. I will be expecting you at the manor tomorrow to pick up the goods. Come, Draco —"

Mr. Malfoy turned to the direction Harry was hiding when he suddenly stopped talking. Harry felt his skin getting damp along his hair line as Mr. Malfoy approached his hiding place. He was afraid the man had caught a glimpse of him through the gap he so dumbly left.

Harry held his hand against his mouth and nose, trying to tamp the sound of his breathing as the man approached more. He was so close that Harry could see the silver pins holding his dark robes together.

Harry exhaled lowly as Mr. Malfoy stopped on the exposed objects to the side of the cabinet, his long fingers hovering above the opals of a necklace resting on a red cushion. There was a warning hand-written in a piece of paper beside it, Caution: Do Not Touch. Cursed — Has Claimed The Lives Of Nineteen Muggles.

"I was under the impression this necklace belonged to the Notts. My own father and grandfather have lusted after it for years." Mr. Malfoy said, reading and snickering at the price tag hanging from it. Harry guessed that 1500 Galleons was overpriced even by the sole owner of the Malfoy's vault.

"Indeed it did, Mr. Malfoy." Said Borgin, smirking slightly as he leant against the counter. "The necklace had been in the Nott's possession for generations. But the current Lord Nott sold it to me, among other of his most... doubtful possessions..., on the week his boy was born."

Mr. Malfoy curled his lips once more, his eyes getting harder and glistening with... such disdain and hatred that Harry shivered slightly. He pressed his back harder against the back of cabinet and averted his eyes from Mr. Malfoy.

"Typical. I should have expected such a nonsense from that spineless, lovestruck fool." Mr. Malfoy huffed under his breath, taking Malfoy by the back of his robes and pulling him roughly against the door. "Do not forget, Mr. Borgin. I'm expecting your punctual presence tomorrow."

The moment the bell rang again and the Malfoys were out of the store, Mr. Borgin dropped his oily, pleasant facade and banged his fist on the counter.

The wizard was angry.

"Good day to yourself, Mister Malfoy, and if the rumours are anything to go by, you haven't sold me half what you keep hidden in your precious manor."

Mr. Borgin was still muttering darkly as he disappeared in the back room once more and Harry counted mentally to five before carefully opening the cabinet door — which thankfully did not creak — and made his way to the door.

If Harry needed any more proof he was lost and that the fireplace did not understand a word of what he said — his mouth had been kind of full of ashes — he got it as soon as he stepped out of the store. Unlike Diagon Alley, the street was surrounded by shadowed stores, the fronts looking a gush of wind away from falling apart. Harry could see announcements of poisonous scented candles and potions that would make one sleep forever. Glancing behind him, he realised that the store he had been in was the tidiest of them all. Borgin & Burkes, it was called. At least it didn't have small heads pending from the ceiling and exposed in the vitrine.

Harry started walking, holding his broken glasses to his face and trying to discretely use his fringe to cover his lighting-shaped scar — just one more of Voldemort's gifts from the night he tried to kill Harry.

He noticed a hunched, dirty witch who was the personification of muggle fairytales approaching him and he hoped she hadn't noticed his movement.

He hoped he would find a way back to the Alley before the witch found her way to him.

Harry was losing his hopes after only a few seconds of having no idea where he should run off to. It was like a cloud of darkness had descended on the street he was aimlessly walking along. Like this cloud was tamping the sun and casting shadows around him, even though Harry knew that it wasn't even lunch time yet.

Harry found a sign on the wall he was passing by and read that he was in Knockturn Alley.

It helped nothing. Harry had never heard of this place before, but he needn't be a genius to conclude that he really shouldn't be there.

"HARRY! What d'yeh think yer doin' down there?"

Harry felt palpable relief as Hagrid's huge form hurriedly came closer to him and the Hogwarts' gate keeper rested his heavy hand on his shoulder. Harry was never happier to stumble forward and have his glasses slid to the very tip of his nose due to the force of the impact.

"Hagrid!" Harry exclaimed. "I got lost — Floo powder —"

Hagrid didn't wait for Harry to finish before he seized him and whisked him in the opposing direction of the hunched witch, who, Harry realised with horror, was holding a glass with floating, human fingernails inside.

Harry went quietly, glad when the street started to lighten and the sun was once again visible from within the shadows.

Harry hadn't realised before that Knockturn Alley and Diagon Alley were so close in proximity. But they were.

Hagrid hadn't taken more than a few short minutes to walk Harry to the front doors of Gringotts, the wizard bank. Hermione was there with her parents, and the Weasleys were heading there from different directions.

Harry laughed half-heartedly as Fred and George complained their mother didn't let them set foot in the other Alley, and he didn't answer Ron when his friends remarked how lucky he was to have gone there. Harry didn't think he was lucky. He was still terrified of what he had seen there.

He had never imagined that the 'Dark Arts' and the 'the Dark Wizards' he was warned about were so much more... radical than Malfoy was at school. He had never stopped to consider that the disdain towards Muggles went beyond it; that it was actually a reason to kill, just like was indicated in the tag near the cursed necklace. He thought that the poisons and disgusting bottled body parts were only superstition, not something common.

But Harry really didn't feel like talking about it any more than the short comments he had satisfied Ron with. Well... he didn't feel like talking about how afraid he was, but he did tell them all about Malfoy and his father.

"Did Lucius Malfoy buy anything from the store, Harry?" Mr. Weasley asked him sharply as they climbed the steps to the bank. He had been clearly listening to the conversation between Harry and his two friends. "Did he seem interest in something?"

"Er..." Harry stuttered, trying to define if what Mr. Malfoy said about the necklace meant he was interested in it or not. "No — he was selling stuff."

"So he's worried!" Mr. Weasley made a noise of triumph. "I would love to get Lucius Malfoy with something..."

Mr. Weasley left his words hanging, much to Harry's annoyance. He wanted to know if Malfoy's father had been right when he said that Mr. Weasley was behind those... how did he call it again? Raids. Harry wanted to know if Mr. Weasley had anything to do with the raids that got Mr. Malfoy in a rush to sell his poisonous artefacts.

But Mr. Weasley found himself distracted by the Muggle money Hermione's parents were exchanging nervously with the goblin at the front on the bank.

So Harry followed suit as the Weasleys and him parted ways with Hermione and made their way to the underground vaults, accompanied by another goblin.

The nausea Harry experienced the year before upon riding the carts that took the costumers to their respective vaults lessened only slightly. It was still going way too fast and taking way too sudden curves. The newly found crowd sharing the space wasn't helping his case either as, every time the goblin turned the strange looking wheel, he bumped into either Ron's knee or Percy's shoulder.

His head was swooning once they finally stopped, many levels above where Harry remembered stopping the last time. Dread filled him as the door of the closest vault opened and Mrs. Weasley rushed inside and Harry saw as she swapped a very little amount of silver Sickles and one single Galleon into her purse.

As they arrived in Harry's vault, he did everything he could to hide the piles of gold he had inside. Unfortunately, his body was still on the skinny side of the spectrum and he was still short. He could hear Ron's gasp and the subsequent smack his mother gave him behind the head.

Harry didn't even count how much he was taking and he ignored the few Galleons that fell back atop the piles in his hurry to shove them in his pocket. He wanted to be done with the process as fast as possible and he even helped the tiny goblin close the door.

Harry, as did the others, remained quiet as they all drove back to the surface and reappeared on the lobby of the bank, where Mr. Weasley and Hermione's parents were waiting for them, still in deep conversation.

Back outside, standing on the marble steps, they all separated. The twins met their Hogwarts friend, Lee Jordan. Percy apparently needed more quills. Mrs. Weasley was going to take Ginny to a second-hand clothes shop and Mr. Weasley was taking the Grangers for a drink at the Leakey Cauldron.

Harry felt a bit bad for Hermione's parents, if he was being honest. His bushy-haired friend barely waved at them as Mr. Weasley whisked them away, to the opposite direction of the bursting streets of the Alley. Her dad still looked out of place, probably trying to disguise his awkwardness by occupying his hands with his wife's and feigning interest in whatever it was Mr. Weasley was telling them.

Maybe Hermione should be going with them, now that Harry considered it.

"We'll meet in one hour back at Flourish and Blotts!" Mrs. Weasley yelled at them one more time, startling a small family climbing the steps to the bank. "And no one is to set foot in Knockturn Alley! This is for you two, Fred, George!"

The twins didn't acknowledge her as they continued to mix with the crowd, only their orange hair distinguishing them from the other dozens of young wizards. Harry and Ron let Hermione lead the way through the packed street and they all stopped by the widows of Quality Quidditch Supplies.

Harry noticed the longing way in which Ron stared at a set of Chudley Cannon robes on sale, the orange colour clashing brightly with the wooden style of the store. He knew, though, that even the five Galleons and two Sickles they were asking made the purchase impossible for his friend. Playing with the coins on his pocket, Harry wondered, if he maybe should buy it as a gift for Ron, as a thank you for rescuing him from his relatives that summer. But he thought better of it. Ron had been a bit upset already when Harry was the one to buy the ice-creams for the three of them on the way to the Quidditch shop.

He was about to attend Hermione's annoyed huffs to the side and encourage Ron to continue walking, when a couple inside the store called his attention.

The woman was very tall for women standards, Harry supposed. When compared to the tiny sized Mrs. Weasley and even his aunt Petunia, Harry knew that woman would tower over them; but, as it was, the top of head reached only the man's — who Harry guessed was her husband — nose.

The woman was incredibly beautiful, though. Harry felt himself blush as he continued to look at her through the vitrine.

Her hair was an ash shade that Harry has never seen before. It was the same colour as the sky minutes before a storm broke loose. It fell in waves down her sides, grazing her waist, which was clad in a tight green dress, almost obscured by the grey cape covering her partially naked shoulders. Harry was more interested in her face, though. Her eyes were almost feline and angular, with flicky lashes and thin appearance. Combined with her fox-like eyebrows, curved and close to her steel blue eyes, Harry expected her to start mocking someone at any minute.

But he really doubted she was going to.

The woman was being hugged from behind by the older, tall and square-jawed man. She seemed relaxed as she leaned into his broad chest and played with the fingers he had around her hips. Her thin mouth was also curved in a smile, directed to a spot in front of her.

Harry felt stupid for believing a couple would just stand in the middle of a Quidditch shop.

There was a boy there, flinging a Beater's bat in the air and smirking as the small girl beside him dodged air as he changed the direction of the swing in the last moment. He seemed to be about Harry's age, maybe as tall as Ron and with hair darker than his parents'.

Harry had never seen him at Hogwarts before, from what he could recall. But, then again, he, Ron and Hermione never really spent much time interacting with others. Harry himself knew the name of no one from Ravenclaw in his year.

"It's just stupid not to allow first years to have brooms." The boy complained, swinging the bat once more and making the little girl run and grab the woman's skirt. They were a family, then. "I'm a much better flyer than lots of fourth years and they are allowed to have a bloody broom."

Harry frowned at the arrogant tone of the boy. He continued to watch as the boy turned his attention to his mother and his smirk widened.

"Look at you, mom. You're old and you still can't fly."

"I will have you know that I am, by no means, old." The woman said, steel blue eyes glistening like a hurricane inside its sockets. Her husband chuckled softly as he buried his face in her neck and mumbled something unintelligible to Harry. "And I do not fly out of option. I don't particularly enjoy the experience, but I most certainly can."

"You don't fly because the wind screws with you hair, mom. No need to hide it."

Harry was sure that Mrs. Weasley would have lashed out at any of her sons before they could count to one for talking to her in that way. But not the woman. The woman simply smiled softly at her son and took a step out of her husband's embrace, taking the bat in her hands and putting it back onto the shelf.

"Come on, Little Star. We should be going to buy your books. Your sister is already getting hungry."

Harry pictured himself as the boy once the small family made its way back to the busy Alley, none of them noticing the three pairs of eyes following them on their way. He wondered if his mother would also have looked at him as if he was the most precious thing in the world to her, like the boy's mother was doing with him. He wondered if his father would also have laced his mother's waist and glared at any man who looked in her direction. He also wondered if his parents would have given him a sibling had they had the chance; and if his little brother or sister would pout up at him as they walked in front of their parents, but still hold his hand tightly.

Harry wished he had had that. He really did.

They arrived at Flourish and Blotts with some time to spare, but Mrs. Weasley and the Grangers were already there.

It has been considerably hard to find them, though. The small store was almost as packed up as the Alley itself and Harry felt claustrophobic just from getting in. The reason for that was the shinny man giving out autographed books at the front of the store.

"I bet most of these women spend their free time with twenty-five cats." Ron mumbled to Harry as they made their way to the paying line after fighting their way into the pile of 'The Standard Book of Spells Grade 2'.

Harry silently agreed with his friend. The crowd seemed to be made up almost uniquely of witches around Mrs. Weasleys age and all dressed in knitted clothing just like her. All of them so different from the regal looking woman Harry had observed at the Quidditch shop.

Hermione apparently didn't agreed, though. She elbowed Ron on his side, making their friend hiss in pain as they sneaked to where their respective parents were waving them closer.

"We can actually meet him! Oh, he is so brilliant!" Hermione squealed. Harry and Ron stared doubtfully at her, their gazes shifting between their friend's tiny beaming form and the blond, idiot-looking man swinging his faint pink cape and smiling at a camera. "I-I mean... he's written almost the whole booklist! Dumbledore must agree that he is the most capable —"

"Oh, big deal, Hermione. So the guy wrote books. I think even Percy has written something or other that he would love to have published." Ron moaned to the side, dodging Hermione's elbow as the line moved and they got a better view of Gilderoy Lockhart. "Yep... he is an idiot. You agree, don't you, Harry?"

Harry nodded dumbly, trying not to laugh at the stand Lockhart built for himself in the bookstore. The tables surrounding the man were taken by large pictures of his own face, all winking and flashing dazzling smiles at the women on the crowd.

The real Lockhart was still posing for the short man representing the Daily Prophet.

"I don't see any reason for the fuss." Ron mumbled again and, this time, Lockhart unfortunately heard him.

"It can't be Harry Potter?!"

The middle-aged crowd immediately parted, as if they had rehearsed, and started whispering excitedly. All of them were staring at Harry, their gazes going from his forehead before doing a full body check, and then focusing back on the scar that he wished he had thought of covering with hair upon entering the store. Lockhart dived forward, seized Harry by the arm and pulled him to the front.

Harry blushed and felt the urge to facepalm as the crowd exploded in applauses and Lockhart motioned the photographer forwards.

Harry grimaced at the sour look on Ron's face, which intensified as the photographer step on his foot as he rushed to the front to get a better angle.

"Nice big smile, Harry," said Lockhart "Together, you and I are worth the front page."

As soon as the dots swimming in Harry's vision due to the flash of the camera vanished, he tried to sneak back to the Weasleys' side, but the arm Lockhart flung around his shoulders restrained him in place.

"Ladies and gentlemen," the shinny blond man said, waving the crowd quiet. "What an extraordinary moment this is! The perfect opportunity for me to make a little announcement I've sitting on for some time! When young Harry Potter stepped into Flourish and Blotts today, he only aimed to buy my autobiography — which I shall be happy to present him now, free of charge — he had no idea that he would shortly be getting much, much more than just my book, 'Magical Me'. He and his schoolmates will, in fact, be getting the real magical me. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I have great pleasure and pride in announcing that this September, I will be taking up the post of Defence Against the Dark Arts Professor at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry!"

The entire crowd clapped and Harry rolled his eyes upon seeing both Hermione and Mrs. Weasley beaming to the side. He staggered forward with the weight of all the works of Gilderoy Lockhart's collection, but managed to squeeze himself between two fat witches and dumbed the books on Ginny's arms.

"You have these." He said to the reddening girl. "I'll buy my own."

With that, Harry escaped to a surprisingly empty corridor, staggering against the shelves filled with books and snapping his head up when he heard a noise close to him.

The family he had observed before was there.

"Theo is taking forever, daddy! I'm hungry!" The beautiful woman's husband was now carrying their daughter on his arms and Harry tilted his head to the side a bit, finding it weirdly cute to see the small girl swinging her legs from side to side as she crushed her cheeks on her father's broad shoulders.

She looked like a stuffed animal like that.

"We're nearly done, sweetheart." The man said, but the pleading look he sent his wife contradicted his statement.

The woman was crunching on the floor, levelled with her son as they skimmed through a book together. She nodded to her husband, but made no move to get up. She only sighed as she continue to rub her son's black hair — even darker than Harry's.

Harry realised that the arrogant boy was almost ripping the pages off the book as he passed them violently and his face was scowling at it.

"I know all this trash already!" He exclaimed, huffing. "Mom, I don't want to waste a year of my life waiting for clueless people to learn how to shake a wand!"

"I know, Little Star, but there is nothing we can do to change the curriculum." The woman was saying, taking the book from her son's hand and handing it to her husband, who took it promptly. "At least you will have more free time than anyone else." She stepped closer to the boy and whispered almost conspiratorially on his ear. "You can explore the castle, discover all the secrets I told you about..."

"And we can arrange for you to have the second year books, if you want, son." The man said, the impatient tone of his voice indicating that they had been discussing that same issue for some time now.

Harry wanted to hear more, he wanted to see what the Malfoy-level arrogant boy would have to say to that, but he heard an extremely loud thud sound coming from where he knew the Weasleys were.

He rounded the corridor he was hiding in and came face to face with a red-faced Ron, who had just thrown a book on the floor and was inches away from a smirking Malfoy.

"You take that back, Malfoy!" Ron roared, attracting the attention of the matrons gathered around them.

"You will have to be more specific, Weasley." Malfoy drawled. "Which part was the most offensive? The public act of charity or the realisation that your family won't have money to buy food for a month after today?"

Harry sprinted forward at the same time that Hermione did and the both of them held Ron back by his robes.

"Ron!" Said Mr. Weasley, struggling past the crowd and his own children to get to them. "What are you doing?!"

"Well, well, well — if it's not Arthur Weasley, the Muggle-lover himself." Lucius Malfoy came down the narrow staircase that Harry hadn't noticed behind the piles of books.

The grimace Harry saw at Borgin & Burkes was sill frozen at the man's expression, but it was ten times meaner as he stared down at Mr. Weasley.

"Lucius." Said Mr. Weasley, nodding coldly.

"Busy time at the Ministry, I hear." Continued Mr. Malfoy. "All those raids... I do hope they are paying you overtime?"

Mr. Malfoy reached for the books inside Ginny's cauldron, examining the frazzled cover of the crumpled-looking books with disgust marring his features. The copies that weren't the ones Harry had handed to her were obviously second-hand. Harry wasn't the only one who noticed that. Mr. Malfoy dumped the copies back onto the cauldron and cleaned his hands on his robes before turning back to Mr. Weasley.

"Obviously not." Mr. Malfoy stated. "Dear me, what's the use of being a disgrace to the name of wizard if you are not even paid well for it?"

Mr. Weasley flushed darker than Ron and Ginny ever had and Harry saw his freckled hands balling into fists.

"We have a very different idea of what disgraces the name of wizard, Malfoy." He said.

"Clearly —" Mr. Malfoy interrupted himself mid-sentence and Harry followed the blond man's line of vision. The small family Harry had seen was ready to leave the bookstore, the small girl still on her father's arms and the beautiful woman was whispering quietly with her son as they walked hand-in-hand. "Oh, what a pleasure, Lorcan. Going out with the family, I see."

"Lucius." The man Mr. Malfoy called Lorcan responded as if he was almost bored and he switched his daughter on his arms, stepping closer to his wife. Harry noticed that the woman was gripping her son's shoulders and her spine was as straight as a broom. Her eyes were guarded as she peered up at Mr. Malfoy, ignoring the Weasleys and all the others gathering around her. "I trust you are well."

"I could be better." Mr. Malfoy sneered. "I recall you know why. Have you fallen victim to the Ministry's newly founded raids recently?"

"No, but I assume it is taking place soon."

"You have taken the necessary precautions, I presume?" Mr. Malfoy had a jabbing edge to his voice and Harry recognised the mocking glint in his eyes.

Lorcan's wife tilted her head manically, the feline traces she had to her face becoming even more prominent as she stared Mr. Malfoy down — even though she was few inches shorter than him. Harry would have been more aware of her than he would of her husband had he been Malfoy's father.

"You presume wrong, I'm afraid." Lorcan answered coldly. "Unlike you, Lucius, I have nothing to hide."

"Keep telling yourself that, Nott." Mr. Weasley hissed, taking one step closer to the other man and raising his wand. Harry was afraid he was going to attack Lorcan Nott in the middle of Flourish and Blotts — while Mr. Nott was holding his daughter, no less —, but Mrs. Weasley decided for him as she came to his side and lowered his arm.

"You don't mess with these people, Arthur!" She told him, pulling him back to the small circle their children created.

Harry noticed Hermione's parents looking scared at the other end of the store and they were trying to call their daughter to them, but Hermione ignored their husked, desperate whispers. She was still glaring daggers at Malfoy, who stood to the side of his father, eyeing the arrogant boy still trapped in his mother's embrace. The blond boy seemed very far away from there, unaware of what was happening around him.

"So you don't think I can't take the likes of Nott and Malfoy?!" Mr. Weasley asked his wife.

"You get them, dad!" Fred and George cheered, receiving a pinch from Percy, who told them not to interfere.

"You are the worst of them all, Nott, and you know it." Mr. Weasley spat at the other man, who brought his wife even closer to him.

Mrs. Nott, however, simply arched an eyebrow in Mr. Weasley's direction. She looked bored, as did her son.

"You ability to analyse character still astonishes me, Weasley." Mrs. Nott drawled, using her fingertips to push her son's strands back from his face.

"You do not talk to my husband like that!" Mrs. Weasley screamed at the other woman, her face matching her husband's in redness. The ones who weren't aware of the confrontation, were aware of it now. There wasn't one person on the store who wasn't openly gaping at them. "Not when yours is housing a war criminal!"

Harry and half of the audience startled at that. The Notts' son took out his probably newly bought wand from his pocket and made to aim it at Mrs. Weasley, but his mother gently grasped his hand in hers.

Mrs. Nott was smirking. Staring down at Mrs. Weasley as if the short woman was a ridiculous joke that she had to stand.

Harry decided he didn't like that woman. He didn't like her at all and he couldn't believe that, even if it had been just for one second, he compared her to his own mother. He felt disgusted at himself for having wished to be her son; to be part of her family.

She was no different from Malfoy. She was also glancing at the Weasleys as if they were dirt under her expensive heels and, as she flapped her ash coloured hair over her shoulder and flashed her teeth at the Weasley couple, Harry felt like stepping forward.

"Always a delight to hear your melodious voice, Weasley-mother." Mrs. Nott said, her tone aristocratic and mocking at the same time. Harry's anger flared brighter. "I would advise you speak a tone louder next time, though. I fear the dead weren't able to hear you."

Mr. Nott chuckled softly as he shook his head, but Harry found himself glaring harder once he noticed the embarrassed flush that took over Mrs. Weasley's features. To his surprise, Mr. Malfoy was also flaring his nostrils at Mrs. Nott, but the woman seemed completely unbothered.

She still appeared the picture of slyness and calmness standing in front of her husband. Smirk still in place.

"You horrible —" Mrs. Weasley started to speak, but she was interrupted.

"I find myself surprised to meet your... family here, Weasley." Mrs. Nott said, her eyes glancing quickly to the bunch of red-heads behind their mother and father. It was like she didn't consider them people from the way she drawled the word 'family', as if she wasn't even slightly bothered by the chance of insulting them, but doing so deliberately anyway. "Sales won't be for another few weeks. You see — I was under the impression you didn't have two Sickles to rub together."

Harry had had it.

"Shouldn't you be bothering someone else?" Harry positioned himself next to Mr. and Mrs. Weasley, green eyes flashing angrily at the woman, who, to his dismay, seemed to find him funnier than the intimidating pose he was trying for. "Mr. Borgin, perhaps? You've sold him dark artefacts before, right?"

Mrs. Nott curled her lips at him, glancing at her husband and indicating Harry with her head, as if what he said was a laughing matter.

"Looks like someone has been eavesdropping in adult conversation, darling." She commented. "You know, Mr. Potter, seeing as you have so much on your... plate already, I would refrain myself from being so nosy. It doesn't agree with you."

"Leave him alone!" Ginny stepped in front of Harry. It was the first time she as much as talked in his presence.

Mrs. Nott arched an unimpressed eyebrow and she was visibly holding back a laugh, her thin, rosy lips quivering in her failed attempt.

"Very well." She said. "I see the little girlfriend offends easily." She said mockingly and Harry flushed as bright as Ginny as Malfoy laughed openly behind them; as did Mrs. Nott' son. "As brain stimulating as this little encounter has proven itself not to be, I have neither time nor patience to deal with more self-righteous and narrow-sighted red heads. Good day to you all. Well, not you, Lucius. I hope your day is as distasteful as your face appears right now."

With that, Mrs. Nott and her son guided the way out of the store, saluting the open-mouthed audience around her as she passed with her son under her arm. Harry was as uncomfortable and out of place as everyone else seemed to be. Even Mr. Malfoy.

Malfoy, thought, was still gazing out of the store window and Harry swore he saw the blond smiling. He turned his head to the scene and he saw Mrs. Nott promptly receiving a lingering, wet-like kiss from her husband and chuckling at her son, who was gesticulating widely.

This time, though, Harry didn't wish he was there with them. This time he was hating that the family was still happy after what Mrs. Nott had done to the Weasleys. As if publicly humiliating an entire family and lashing out at children was nothing.

Harry just followed the Weasley children as their parents guided them outside — after Mr. Weasley had made sure that the Notts were gone. He noticed that Hermione's parents were whispering with their heads closed together, Hermione's mother saying with certainty that she was sure it had been 'her'. Whoever this 'her' was, Harry had no interest in knowing.

"Did you get what that woman said, Harry?" Ron asked him quietly as they walked down the street, in the direction of the Leakey Cauldron.

"Oh, how stupid must you be, Ronald?" Hermione said irritability from next to them, her brown eyes rolling almost to the back of her skull. "She called your family poor and morally misguided."

"Er — what?" Ron asked.

"She basically said that your parents think they are morally better than everyone, but they are still blind to a big scenario."

"But they aren't!" Ron exclaimed. "Dad says that the Notts are even worse than the Malfoys. They are the bigoted ones!"

"We know, Ronald!" Hermione snapped. "Which was why Lady Nott knew which buttons to press. She must know her husband in under the suspicion of the Ministry and is trying to intimidate your father, who is conducting the raids. Of course, even you two must know that the raids are only a facade to catch wizards in possession of dark artefacts. I mean, your father is part of it, after all, Ron, and Harry has been staying at your house this summer. You two certainly should have heard of it by now. Lady Nott is wrong, though, so she will only get to you if you let her and your parents unfortunately did. You too, Harry."

Ron and Harry remained quiet, both of them annoyed at Hermione's little speech.

Harry could only think, though, that maybe his bushy-haired friend was wrong. He doubted very much that Mrs. Nott was even slightly worried about the raids. He doubted her intention had been to intimidate Mr. Weasley.

He was sure Mrs. Nott was aiming to stab something deeper, much more hurtful than simply intimating a low-employee of the Ministry such as Mr. Weasley.

There was something else Harry was almost sure, though. He didn't think Malfoy had been the one to send Dobby to the Dursleys' house earlier in the summer.

Chapter Text

“I’m telling you, Harry!” Ron exclaimed louder than the squeaking of the wooden steps of the twisted staircase of the Burrow. 

It had been a few days since the rather eventful visit to Diagon Alley and, upon noticing that no one brought up what happened at Flourish and Blotts, Harry decided to follow the pattern and keep quiet. 

They went normally back to their routines. 

Harry woke up in Ron’s room, stirred awake by his friend’s loud snores. He had breakfast with the Weasleys — minus Ginny, who was still mute in his presence. He did Ron’s shores with him and they spent the rest of the afternoon lazing around. Today they had played Quidditch with the twins in the vast field that surrounded the Burrow and dinner had been a quiet affair — well, aside from Percy discussing with his father his future prospects after being Head Boy in his last year at school. 

“I heard him, I swear!” Ron continued his ranting and Harry laughed at his friend. “Percy thinks he will be the youngest Minister of Magic! He was rehearsing his speech when I got in the bathroom to get the fairy repellent for the garden!”

“He does seem a bit obsessed with a career at the Ministry.” Harry commented. 

“A bit?!” Ron exclaimed just as they passed Percy’s closed door. “He is bloody mental! Did you hear what he was asking dad at dinner? He wants to know if Dumbledore will promote him to Head Boy if he proves he has unquestionable authority! I bet he is gonna be ten times the rule-freak he already is this year, just you wait.” 

Harry grimaced at the thought. From all the Weasleys Harry knew, Percy was the one he considered the most boring one — and that included mute Ginny. He couldn’t even imagine an even more boring and rules-bent Percy. 

They were passing through Mr. and Mrs. Weasley’s bedroom door when they heard the loud voice of Ron’s mother. For a moment, Harry thought the plump woman was standing right behind them and would reprimand them for staying up so late, even though she told them they would be leaving early for the platform the following day, but then he realised she would have no reason to tell them what she was saying. 

“I’m begging you, Arthur, as your wife, to stop participating in the raids!” Mrs Weasley squeaked again and, just like Harry, Ron also glued his ear to the door. 

“Molly dear, you know I can’t deny —”

“I don’t care if it was Dumbledore or minister Fudge himself who asked you to pass the Act!” Mrs. Weasley continued loudly. “You told me no one would realise it, Arthur, but all those Dark Wizards already know the raids are only a pretence. You heard that... that woman, Arthur! They know they are being targeted!”

“We have everything under control, dear. I promise. The raids are necessary!” Mr. Weasley’s voice was pleadingly and Harry could imagine the bolding man hunching forward to take his wife’s hands in his and pushing his glasses to the bridge of his long, freckled nose. “Imagine the relief, if we were to catch Lucius Malfoy — !”

“Your rivalry with Malfoy is starting to become childish, Arthur, honestly.” Mrs. Weasley hissed hotly. “That man is dangerous, dear. Nott is dangerous and that woman is — she is evil! I don’t even want to imagine what they would do to you if you were to find anything in their houses.”

“Oh, Molly dear...” Harry wasn’t able to hear what Mr. Weasley said next. 

“You know —”

“It is very frowned upon —”

“To eavesdrop on people’s conversations!”

Fred and George had snuck up on Harry and Ron like shadows. Harry’s heart was beating faster after the minor heart attack the twin’s sudden presence caused him and he was under no conditions to reply. 

“What are you two doing here?” Ron hissed at his brothers. 

“We came to save you from a beating, of course.” Fred — or maybe George — answered. 

“Good pals that we are.” Added... the other one. “Why don’t we take our chit-chat to your room, Ronnickins? Mom has vampire hearing, as I believe you know.”

“Don’t remind me.” Ron mumbled, leading the way to the highest room of the house and closing the door behind him once Harry, Fred and George were all inside. 

“Er — so, what were your parents talking about?” Harry asked after five seconds in which no one uttered a word. 

The twins shared a look and, upon glancing over at Ron — who managed to steal a cauldron cake from the basket in the kitchen and was currently shoving it inside his mouth — Harry noticed his friend was just as confused as he was — if not more. 

Unlike Harry, though, Ron just shrugged and threw himself back on his bed — coughing as the cauldron cake got stuck midway down his throat. 

“You see, Harry, —”

“Our little famous friend, —”

“Some topics are strictly forbidden for being even mentioned in our lovely house.”

“The First War being one of them.” 

The twins took turns speaking and Harry gave up on trying to look directly at the speaking one the second time his glasses slid down his nose. He didn’t understand why they couldn’t have a normal conversation. 

Harry also didn’t quite understand why what Fred and George were saying was exactly relevant. 

“What do the Malfoys and the Notts have to do with the war anyway?” Harry asked and he flushed a bit when Ron and the twins only blinked at him, seeming incredulous. 

“Er — they fought in the war, Harry.” Ron said carefully. “For the other side, I mean.”

“Malfoy’s father fought for Voldemort?!” Harry was... well, enraged. Angrier than before. 

Malfoy then wasn’t just another obnoxious rich kid, nothing like the snobs Dudley liked to surround himself with. He was worse than that. His father took part in the murder of Harry’s parents. His father was partially to blame for Harry being an orphan. 

And Malfoy had the guts to mock him for it. 

Harry never hated anyone half as much as he hated the Malfoys right now. 

“That’s where the story gets tricky.” One of the twins said. 

“He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named had many followers. They used to do his deed, you see.”

“Mr. Malfoy and Mr. Nott were both one of them. Some say they were rather active actually. But, —”

“They were found innocent when you got rid of the bad guy for us, Harrykins.” 

“But why?!” Harry exclaimed, starting to pace the room — much to the twins’ amusement. 

“They claimed to have been under influence when they joined the other side.” 

“And there wasn’t enough proof to send them to jail.” The other twin — who Harry was almost sure to be Fred — said.

“But people believed them? What did the Ministry expect?!” Harry exclaimed. “That Malfoy would just plead guilty and offer his wrists for the shackles?!”

“Well, the Ministry didn’t have much choice, did it, mate?” Another twin said. “As Fred said, there was no evidence against them. What they said was the only truth the Ministry had.”

“That’s not fair!” Harry mumbled, sitting on the edge of the bed that he claimed as his and pushing his dark fringe away from his eyes. 

Ron and the twins just nodded along with him, but they didn’t appear half as bothered as Harry. They had had more time to cope than him, Harry supposed, but it was not like the war had such a tragic impact on their lives as it did on Harry’s.

They still had both of their parents, all their siblings and, from what Ron mumbled every once in a while, they also had other living relatives. Harry was left with nothing after Voldemort made his move.

And to discover that the man’s followers walked free...

“What about Mrs. Nott?” Harry asked abruptly, remembering the hateful way Mrs. Weasley had referred to her. Evil, she had said. “Was she a follower as well?”

“Mrs. Nott is another forbidden topic on this house.” The one he knew now to be George commented, annoyance clear on his face. “Mom made Fred and I take care of the gnomes without the pesticide for two weeks when we asked the last time the Notts made the first page of the Daily Prophet.”

“But George and I heard an interesting discussion some years ago, haven’t we, George?”

“Indeed we have, Fred.” 

They stayed silent after that. 

“Would you two just spill it out already?!” Ron hissed and Harry was thankful for the outburst. 

“How impatient you are tonight, dear brother of mine.” Said Fred, amused at Harry’s and Ron’s frustration shining in his brown eyes and just irritating Harry further. 

“You should work on this, Ronnie. It will prepare you for the future. Who knows, maybe you will follow Percy’s footsteps and will soon be rehearsing speeches in front of the mirror while you think no one is listening to you making a fool of yourself.”

“Don’t kid with that, George!” Ron exclaimed.

“Can we get back to Mrs. Nott already?” Harry snapped, feeling the urge to hex all three of them for not taking their conversation seriously, Ron especially. 

Ron had been there the year before. He had gone inside the trapdoor and he had seen with his own eyes the dead unicorn on the floor of the Forbidden Forest. He knew that Voldemort wasn’t really dead and that he was looking for a way to come back. 

And now, upon discovering that the man who killed Harry’s parents had followers roaming around, that his own father was working together with the Headmaster of Hogwarts to catch them, Ron was more worried about his brother’s taking the mickey out of him. 

And the twins too! They were older, maybe they could even remember bits and pieces of the time Voldemort was still on the loose. Yet, here they were, trying to irk Harry into a fit instead of explaining to him why a woman that came within two feet from him was considered such a serious threat. 

“Of course, Harry, —” said George. 

“No need to get your knickers into a twist, mate. We’re getting there.” Fred completed, regaining an ounce of the seriousness Harry was aiming for. “We only know that Lady Nott did something terrible by the time He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named fell.”

“From what he could gather at the time,” George continued. “she killed someone, but mom sent us away with a stinging hex on the arse before we could hear much more”

“She... killed someone?” Harry whispered, the weight of the words leaving a dry, bad taste in his mouth. As horrible as Mrs. Nott had seemed to be at Flourish and Blotts, Harry couldn’t imagine the same woman who smiled at her son and brushed his hair back so tenderly taking a life. “W-Was she with Voldemort?”

Harry internally rolled his eyes as the three Weasleys shivered as he said the name out loud. 

“No.” Fred answered, but then Harry noticed doubt momentarily flickering across his freckled face. “At least George and I don’t think so.” 

“Why not?” Harry asked. 

“Well,” George continued. “every time dad even mentions Lucius Malfoy and Lorcan Nott, he always calls them Dark Wizards and You-Know-Who’s followers. He never said anything similar about Mrs. Nott.”

“Yeah. They always call her ‘that woman’ and leave it at that.” Said Fred. 

They all startled as the stairs creaked somewhere below them and the twins stood up in a flash. 

“This must be mum —” Said George. 

“Or it could be Percy.” Fred grimaced. “Can’t even tell which one is worse these days.”

“Anyway. We should get going before someone realises we’re not snoring the night away.”

“Night, mates!”                                                                                  

The twins vanished as fast as they had come, but Harry continued in the same position, sitting on the bed. 

“You alright, Harry?” Ron asked him, an edge of uncertainty on his slightly quivering tone. 

“Er — yeah.” Harry said vaguely, lying down before kicking his shoes from his feet. “Yeah, I’m fine. Just tired. Good night, Ron.”

“Night, Harry.” Ron said, voice still uncertain. 

Harry ignored it for the time being, his head too full to care. 

Too many questions and not enough answers made his brain burn. He had never before stopped to even consider that Voldemort wouldn’t have been nearly as feared as he was if he was completely alone in his delusional quest. 

Harry felt so incredibly stupid for believing all this time that Voldemort hadn’t got any followers, the so-called Dark wizards that graduated from Slytherin every year. He never stopped to wonder where all those seventeen-year-old Dark Wizards and witches went after school, what they did and with whom they fraternised. 

And now he was wondering about it all and still not understanding any of it. 

How could have been no proof at all that incriminated Mr. Malfoy and Mr. Nott? How come no one knew for sure if they were involved or not? Both men had probably been Slytherins, isn’t that proof enough? How did Voldemort get so many followers? Why were the two men following him in the first place? Their leader wanted to murder a baby for no reason! 

Harry wondered for the first time if Voldemort also needed money, and not just followers. And, if he did, how did he get it? Did he steal the bank like he and Quirrel, the former professor of Defence Against the Dark Arts of Hogwarts, had attempted to do the year before? Was Voldemort rich? Maybe even richer than the Malfoys? Or did his followers have to pay to follow him, like Muggles who went to the Church had to pay that tax uncle Vernon was always complaining about? 

Harry didn’t know and he doubted Ron did. 

He didn’t feel like asking Hermione, as she would make a huge fuss and make the three of them spend all their breathing time in the library trying to find out. Harry also knew there was no way he could just come up to an adult and ask the questions. He knew everything they were going to say. They would tell him not to worry about such things, that he was too young. Mrs. Weasley would chastise him for eavesdropping and then call him ‘dear’ while sending him on his way. 

His frustration grew so much that Harry yanked his shirt down until he heard the sound of fabric ripping. He stopped then, knowing that this was one of the few shirts he possessed; knowing that, if he used his money to buy clothes at a wizard store, his aunt would burn them as soon as she set sight on it. 

So Harry just rolled to his side, just then realising that he was still wearing his recently fixed glasses and taking them off. Ron was already snoring on the bed next to his and Harry judged and envied his friend at the same time. 

He knew he wouldn’t be able to sleep that night. 

Not when the prospect of spending a year in the company of the arrogant boy he saw in the store, the one who thought he knew everything and that he was better than everyone. Mrs. Nott’s son — Theo Nott, Harry assumed his name was. He was already dreading the boy’s presence, already knowing that he would have another Malfoy to deal with this year. 

One single, thundering question was also making it hard for Harry to even blink for more than a second at a time. 

He wanted to know who was it that Mrs. Nott had killed.

Chapter Text

Life at Hogwarts has never been so dull. 

Harry had loved every single second of the previous year, but he guessed even a doorknob would be interesting to a boy who had barely ever left a cupboard and was seeing magic for the very first time. 

This year, however, Harry just felt tired already. Exhausted and irritated after only four weeks of classes. 

But he assumed his circumstances had been everything but normal that year. 

He felt like he was staring into the swirling, pitch black waters of the Black Lake. Completely unable to see the bottom; and, when he submerged his head to try and find some peace of mind, some remote illusion of clearance, he also couldn’t distinguish just how far was the surface. 

Sometimes he wondered why he wasn’t more like Ron. His friend had been by his side at the platform and he had been there when they arrived at school. Still, Harry remained the only one who couldn’t sleep at night without knowing just why they had been unable to go through the passageway. 

First it had been Dobby, the house-elf that Harry now knew not to be Malfoy’s, appearing on his bedroom and warning him about a danger inside the castle. 

Then, at the station, Harry and Ron had been the only ones barred out from entering platform 9 3/4 to take the Hogwarts Express and go to school. 

Harry wished at least a single professor had believed that he and Ron had had a reason to take Mr. Weasley’s car and fly all the way to the Scottish Highlands. But apparently no one did. 

Upon arriving at Hogwarts’ grounds, the car crashed against the Whomping Willow before throwing them out and heading to the forest. 

That particular disaster had them going straight to Snape’s office. The potions master had kindly told them to stop breathing while he yelled at them about their incompetence. 

So, in the first night at school, Harry already had detention every week for the next three months with Lockhart, the most ridiculous professor anyone could ever hire. Harry doubted the blond man knew a single spell that actually worked, but, of course, all Gryffindoors were forbidden from saying a single bad word about their new Defence Against the Arts professor without Hermione going on a senseless rant about how brilliant the wizard was and how they were wrong to disrespect a professor. 

And, if that wasn’t enough, Mrs. Weasley sent a screaming letter, which Harry discovered to be a Howler, blaming them - well, mostly Ron - for the troubles Mr. Weasley was having at work because they had been seen by 37 Muggles outside the station driving a flying car. 

Harry swore he had never been so embarrassed in his life. The eyes of every single student having breakfast at the Great Hall were trained on him and Ron, their gazes piercing into the back of his skull and Harry had no idea where to look. 

For a second after Mrs. Weasley was finished there was absolute, deafening silence. The only noise filling Harry’s hears had been his own laboured breathing and the blood flowing to his face. 

Well, at least until someone cracked a laugh at the Slytherin table. Harry had stolen a glance at the snakes as Hermione pulled him and Ron by their robes out of the Great Hall and saw the other reason why his second year at Hogwarts sucked so much. 

Harry hadn’t interacted with Theo Nott, per se, but the Slytherin boy irked him even more than Malfoy ever did. 

Hermione knew nothing about Lady Nott, dead set in her previous analysis that the woman was just trying to intimidate Mr. Weasley and had no bite to her words. Harry hated to contradict Hermione. He knew that, among the three of them, she was undoubtedly the smartest. But still. 

He didn’t think a woman Mrs. Weasley was so afraid of was just a shallow, rich lady who cared uniquely about her shoes, like Hermione said. 

Harry couldn’t stop thinking about the person Lady Nott murdered. Every time he saw her son roaming the halls, a smirk on his face, his school bag clearly empty and his green and silver tie unknotted around his neck, he couldn’t stop thinking that Hermione said the hat needed barely more than a second to place him in Slytherin. 

Harry couldn’t stop thinking that Theo Nott was raised by a Voldemort follower and a cold-blooded murdered. 

So, when the dark haired boy smirked at Ron and said to Malfoy “Weasley-mother finally managed to deafen the dead now”, the desire to punch Nott surpassed his shame. 

He just couldn’t take Nott anymore. Couldn’t take the sight of the other boy smoothing his wavy hair back and smirking at him when they passed each other. Unlike Malfoy, Nott never said a single thing to him. He never mocked Harry, never tried to get a rise out of Ron, and never returned Hermione’s disdain the few times they saw the Slytherin in the library. 

Nott just continued there, looking at them with unreadable grey eyes and an arched eyebrow. Harry hated that he couldn’t know what Nott was thinking. What was going on inside his head. 

He hated that Nott was a whole year younger than him, but he was taller than Harry and he wasn’t weird looking!

The clock above the fireplace rang nine o’clock at night and Harry felt Ron poking his side. 

They were sitting together at the Gryffindoor common room, occupying the warm, puffy couch further away from the widow and using the wooden table to do their Herbology assignment. 

Harry sighed upon noticing he had filled barely four inches of the foot long essay, but he supposed he had some time still. And Professor Sprout was one for second chances. He could easily tell her he had no time and she would be fine with the rather insufficient excuse. 

“Is it time already?” Harry asked Ron, not having it on himself to laugh at the grimace marring Ron’s features. 

“Yeah.” He answered, turning to the portrait without bothering to collect his things. Harry would doubt nothing that Ron was hoping someone - probably the twins - would drop something gruesome on his parchment that would render his scrawl even more unreadable, so Hermione would take pity on him again and let him copy hers. “At least we can be together this time. We won’t be back so late.”

“Thank Merlin for that.” Harry mumbled as they crossed to the silent hallway, most of the portraits preparing themselves to retire for the night. “Oliver has been so desperate for the Cup this year. Training is starting earlier every week.”

Ron didn’t answer immediately and Harry stole a glance at his friend when he took a moment too long. 

Ron was with his head turned away from him, half of his freckled face covered by the gloom of the torches illuminating their way down the staircase. Harry couldn’t see his exact expression, only the long nose poking out of Ron’s face visible enough for inspection, but Harry could tell he had somehow rilled Ron up. 

His nostrils were flaring slightly and the old man sitting on a throne with his head tilted back and grapes angling from his fingertips, was not as interesting as Ron’s piercing gaze indicated. 

Harry had to fight his own temper to keep himself from snapping. 

Ron hadn’t made the Quidditch Team that year and, even after two weeks, the subject was still a sour spot for him. Harry could understand, of course, so he had indulged Ron is his well-thought excuses, blaming Oliver’s obsessiveness and controlling nature as to why he refused to nominate Ron. He had avoided speaking of his own training sections and had even hidden his gears once or twice so his friend wouldn’t catch sight of them. 

But this was getting too much. As far as Harry was concerned, they had much more to worry about than Ron’s hurt pride. 

He was tired of tip-toeing around his own dorm so Ron wouldn’t get into a jealous fit and give him the cold shoulder for an hour or two, before coming back as if nothing at all had happened. 

The heavy silence weighed on them until the torches on the walls started to become fewer and further away from one another, whole portions of their way lightened only and poorly by the moonlight coming from the minuscule holes right under the tall, stoned ceiling. 

They had arrived at the dungeons, where they were to serve detention cleaning one of the many trophy rooms they had been assigned. 

Harry guessed not even Ron’s pettiness stopped him from coming closer to his side, their arms now brushing against one another and Ron’s breathing coming out in loud huffs of air.

The dungeons have always given them the chills. At night time, it was even worse. 

Everything was so still down there. So paralysingly cold. There was such a bunch of nothingness, that Harry often caught himself watching the dark corners as if the shadows had secrets of their own and were hiding something. 

He wondered sometimes what was of Hogwarts before it became a school. Why there was the need to have a dungeon in the first place. What they were thinking when no one ever spelled it into in-existence instead of transforming it into a habitable environment. 

It was fitting, though, that the Slytherins had their common room at the rotten bottom of the castle. Where the sun never shined and they were underground, surrounded by the mysterious waters of the black lake. Harry often wondered if that detail had also been on proposes, maybe even a precaution of sorts. 

He wondered if there was a reason the dungeons were built to be surrounded by water, by the beasts Harry had no doubt were lurking in the depths of the lake, either the preys or the predators of the giant squib.

Harry wondered if all it would take was a simple incantation to trap and drown all the prisoners there - all the Slytherins. 

He doubted, but it was a good enough reassurance. 

“You don’t reckon Malfoy and Nott froze to death sleeping down here, do you?” Ron shivered next to him, stepping even closer when the single portrait of that hall grunted something in his sleep. 

“Unfortunately not.” Harry answered, deciding to follow Ron’s cue and ignore his lapse in behaviour and speak his mind now that his friend brought up the topic he was itching to talk about. “You noticed they have been sticking together too, then? Hermione just told me to stop obsessing over Malfoy and that I was seeing things.”

“Well, it’s not like I’ve been keeping tabs on them or anything.” Ron said, eyeing Harry warily, but, unlike Hermione, he just shrugged and turned his gaze back forward. “Ginny said they have been closer than the twins, though. She told me Malfoy waits for Nott after every class and they just disappear every afternoon.”

Harry fought the urge to roll his eyes. He couldn’t believe Ron hadn’t thought to mention it to him before and it was not like he could afford to depend on mute-Ginny to track what Nott was doing, even thought they shared classes at least once every day. Ginny still went catatonic when they came face to face. 

“Do you think they are up to something?” Harry asked.

“Slytherins are always up to something.” His friend said simply and Harry couldn’t understand how Ron could be so... offhanded about it. “And anyway, you heard Fred and George, right? About You-Know-Who’s followers.”

“I don’t think Voldemort would want to recruit Nott and Malfoy, though.”

“What? - No, of course not.” Ron said, his hands gesticulating widely as if he could physically erase what Harry had said. This time, Harry did roll his eyes at his friend. “That’s not what I meant.”

“Then what did you mean, Ron?”

“Well, you know... evil people hang together.” 

Harry could just nod. 

Ron did have a point there, though. There was a reason why Voldemort was able to have so many followers and maybe there was also a reason why Slytherins so rarely made friends - or allies, as Harry had heard some of them refer to their peers once - outside their own House. 

Evil people did fraternised with evil people. It wouldn’t make much sense if they didn’t, actually. 

But to think that Nott and Malfoy were so close already. Closer than the twins, Ron and Ginny had said. Harry was even afraid to imagine what they might do. 

Fred and George said more than once that the Malfoys were so powerful within the Wizarding World that they were also immensely dangerous. And the Notts were no different. If Mr. and Mrs. Weasley, who were grown wizards and trained in magic, were so scared of the two families, Lady Nott specially, Harry was even more worried than before. 

His mind took him back to the year before and how everyone ignored - consciously or not - the signs that Voldemort was at Hogwarts, trying to come back to the land of the living. The answers had been right there all along. Quirrell, the Defence Against the Dark Arts professor who had been aiding Voldemort, had been right under their noses, but he was still able to infiltrate the castle’s defences and almost get a hold of the Sorcerer’s Stone, which would make it possible to revive his master. 

Harry couldn’t help but think that the anomalies this year were already there, but still, no one seemed to realise it. 

Harry and Ron were crossing a gate - which looked suspiciously like a cell door - to the trophy room they were heading to, when footsteps sounded just behind them, climbing down the steps Ron had tripped over seconds before. 

He heard Ron whimpering behind him and Harry touched his wand under the sleeve of his robe, feeling more comfortable to know that it was there. 

He imagined what it could be. If there was a someone or a something that was following them. He momentarily considered it to be Nott playing a prank on them - which would definitely classify the owner of the footsteps as a something - when he remembered that there was no way the other boy knew that they would be there that time. 

Harry’s throat was closing in, his airways constricting as he tried to control his ragged breath - uselessly, considering that Ron was hyperventilating next to him as the footsteps approached - when the tall, straight figure of Professor McGonagall appeared in front of them. 

The professor was dressed more elegantly than usual, which was already saying something. The green robes were lined with gold and the shoes on her feet had heels on their back. The hat was still atop of her head, but it wasn’t the same she lectured with. It was... fancier, Harry guessed. Not tilted to the side and the material was glistening, even in the barely lit room they were all in. 

The professor also looked weirdly anxious. Harry had never seen her in such a state before. Not even once. Her hands, usually holding her wand firmly, were twitching the fabric of her long skirts and she hadn’t stopped switching her weight from foot to foot since she came to a halt in front of them. 

“Potter, Weasley, you are relieved of your detention.” McGonagall’s voice also had an edge to it and she spoke faster than she did in class. So much so, that Harry’s brain took a few moments to understand what her words meant and happiness took seconds too long to settle in. “Professor Snape and myself are otherwise engaged tonight and will not be able to supervise your progress.”

“Sweet!” Ron celebrated, his fist returning to his side upon being glared at by the Transfiguration professor. 

“Tomorrow, Mr. Weasley, you and Mr. Potter are to make up for tonight’s appointment. Both of you must be ready at eight o’clock sharp. Mr. Weasley, you will be with me. Potter, Professor Lockhart will be waiting for you in his classroom.”

Harry groaned low in his throat, dreading his captive under Lockhart already. 

“Now, off you go. Curfew will be in a few short minutes and you two have no excuses to be out anymore.”

Harry and Ron passed through the gap between McGonagall and the gate, rushing out of the dungeons. 

On their way back to the common room, one of the staircases changed, taking them to the floor with the Headmaster Tower. 

They would have to cross the whole castle to go back to Gryffindoor Tower. And they better hurry, before they were caught out of their beds. 

Even though they were running against the clock, Harry and Ron stopped dead in their tracks upon seeing the tree adults walking their way. 

Professor Snape was sneering, but, this time around, it wasn’t at Harry. The potions master was sneering ahead of him, at nothing as his black robes dragged on the stone floor behind him. The man took no notice of the two students he disliked the most as he passed them, heading straight to the Gargoyle guarding the entrance to what Harry assumed was Dumbledore’s office. 

Harry glared at the couple following him. 

Mr. Nott spared them no glance, his cognac coloured eyes trained uniquely on the beautiful woman - no, the murderer - leaning into his side. His tall body was hunched forward slightly, in a way that his head was very close to his wife’s, his lips moving slowly close to her ear as she nodded along with whatever it was he was saying. 

Again, Harry couldn’t help but notice the protective way in which Mr. Nott held his wife. The way he was always touching some part of her, the way she seemed to be his whole world; not bothered by what was happening around him as long as the ash-haired woman was by his side. As long as she continued to use his chest as refuge and continued to caress his knuckles as they massaged her hips in return. 

Despite who they were, Harry couldn’t help but wonder if his parents had been like that. 

Mrs. Nott had her hair pulled in a braid this time and Harry again was astonished at her appearance. Her cheekbones were high, so  incredibly sharp that he wondered if it would hurt to simply brush against them. Her eyes were so deep, as if she was hiding secrets in a hurricane of steel blue. Her hair was like pure ashes, like she had been set aflame, but survived unscathed. 

She looked like a queen. A wicked queen without a crown, taken right from inside a dusted painting, as if she was the forbidden secret of a kingdom. 

An assassin queen. 

Her feline gaze locked on Harry’s emerald green ones the moment she nuzzled her husband’s jaw, but, unlike Harry, who glared at her, trying to show that he was not afraid of her mere presence, that he knew exactly what she was, hers remained stoic, impenetrable. 

Her thin, red painted lips curled to the side, mockingly or softly Harry couldn’t even discern when the person was her, but he flushed in embarrassment. 

Pulling Ron by his sleeve, he led the way back to their common room, mind swirling as to why the Notts would come to Hogwarts so late at night. 

“Why do you think they’re here?” Ron asked him, looking behind them as if to make sure that the couple - or their professor - wouldn’t hear him, never mind that they had descended two flight of stairs already and had heard the Gargoyle recoiling after the three adults climbed in. 

Harry didn’t feel like calling his friend on that, though. Not when the fear of being overheard was shared by him. 

He could never be too sure when dark wizards were involved. 

“Don’t know.” Harry answered, his voice just as low. “It’s not like we could just stop them and ask.”

“I know.” Ron mumbled. “But, blimey, Nott’s mother gives me the chills. What is it with her?”

“I have no idea. Wouldn’t mind never seeing her again, though.”

“I know what you mean, mate. Fred and George might not think she was a follower, but she sure as hell would fit the profile. Besides, where do you reckon she met her husband? It couldn’t have been Hogwarts like everyone else.”

Harry tilted his head to the side, pondering. 

“What are you on about?”

“Almost everyone marries young in our world, Harry. Mum and dad are the rule, not the exception.” Ron explained, more coherently than he ever did before. “People meet while they are here and they usually continue together after, but the Notts have to have met somewhere else.”

“And you think that Voldemort’s ranks or whatever was the perfect place.” Harry concluded, now understanding where Ron’s mind had taken him. 

“Yeah.” Ron rubbed his hair, seemingly doubtful now, but then he shrugged. “It would make sense, wouldn’t it? Mr. Nott was a follower for sure, but no one knows anything about his wife, only that she is a lot younger than him. What better place to meet than doing You-Know-Who’s deeds together?”

It did make an awful lot of sense, but it still didn’t, though. 

If she was a follower, then why not just say so? Why did Mrs. Weasley separated her crime from her husband’s if they were doing the same thing? Why be so scared of Mrs. Nott when she supposedly did nothing different from what her husband and Malfoy’s dad did? 

“Anyway” Ron continued “Percy reckons that the last time parents came to Hogwarts, was when this kid got expelled. Maybe we are in luck and Nott will be going home forever. He could take Malfoy with him, though.”

Harry cracked a laugh. “That would be perfect actually.”

And it would. 

Harry went to bed that night hoping that Nott - at least - wouldn’t be there the next day to bother him. Hoping that his second year would be a good one, without threats and without worries. 

A year at Hogwarts like everyone else experienced. Like it should have been since the beginning. 

Chapter Text

Lorcan Nott had no other option but to thank his upbringing in times such as this. 

Had he not been a Pureblood, he wouldn’t have come to the school upon being summoned by the headmaster and he would have snapped the moment the old man offered him tea and kept him waiting until he prepared his after Lorcan and his wife refused the offer. 

Ravenna had had the exact same upbringing that he did, which was why he knew that she wanted Dumbledore and the other two members of the faculty standing stiff beside him to know that she was increasingly bored. 

Bored only on the surface, though. 

Ravenna hadn’t let go of his hand since they left their daughter’s bedroom and apparated outside the school grounds. His wife has been clinging to him since Theo said his final goodbyes and borded the train -- to spend months away from home, from her.

Ravenna had grinned broadly at Theo as his head appeared on the window, beaming with pent-up excitment at prospect of causing havoc somewhere other than their manor. As his waving hand disappeared in the fog and the train accelerated, though, his wife's smile had frozen, and her expression had turned painfully stoic as she sought his hand with hers and gripped him tightly. Lorcan had said nothing -- had known she wouldn't have appreciated the verbal acknowledgement of her moment of weakness. But Lorcan had hugged her to him, he had kissed her temple with the same reverance he touched her on their wedding, and he had craddled her to him as she brought their daughter to sleep in their bed with them that night -- needing to have the comfort of their children close. 

Lorcan did not mind it -- being her support. He did not mind that Ravenna has stayed sitting on his lap silently every afternoon she came to his study while their daughter was being tutored. He did not mind to run into her her hugging and playing with their daughter or standing stoically at Theo's door while the Elves kept his room pristine. 

The letter from the school had affected her, though. It was not longing for their oldest child that had made Ravenna cling to his arm, then, but barely veiled apprehension.

Lorcan hated to see her like this just as much as he loved it. 

He hated to see her distressed. Knew Ravenna was the proudest of people, that she abhorred vulnerability, her own specially. He hated to see her in pain, as he felt it in his bones when she did. And letting go of Theo had taken its tool on her. It had dragged her down to let go of her little boy and Lorcan had never seen Ravenna looking so... unsure before. 

At the same time, though, he loved that she loved him so much that she wasn’t bothered to show him all her weaknesses. She wasn’t afraid to lean onto him, to use him as her rock just like he has used her as his since they met. 

If Lorcan could kill all of those who have ever mistreated Ravenna, he would. If he could take Theo home with them and teach the boy himself, he would do so in the blink of an eye. If he could isolate their family from the rest of the world, he would do it, too. 

He would do it in a second. 

But he knew he couldn’t. Not with his past and not with his wife’s staining them. Cementing them in a position where they could only go with the flow and do whatever they could to keep their heads afloat and the dangers away. 

So Lorcan simply refused the second armchair the headmaster offered to fetch for them, deciding to share the one already there with his wife and hold her close to keep her grounded. 

While Dumbledore mixed the contents inside his mug, Lorcan focused on Ravenna instead. 

She was smart. Just like him, she knew that the headmaster was stalling in the hopes that one of them would give him the satisfaction of cracking. She knew that she would have to keep her words simple, her dark mood subtle and her posture composed, as to not give Albus Dumbledore ammunition to use against them in the off-chance of one of the artefacts in his office warn him of something amiss. 

Lorcan was always so in awe of her. After twelve years of marriage, even more of knowing her, he could actually retell how her mind worked. 

And damn him if he ever bothered to veil just how much he enjoyed the woman lacing his fingers with her delicate ones. That was one piece of information that he wanted everyone to know. That he wanted to throw on the faces of the lust-driven men that salivated at the mere mention of Ravenna Nott. 

The sound of the headmaster swallowing and then humming at his beverage had Ravenna snorting as she laid her head on his chest and Lorcan had to hide his mouth in her bound hair so his amusement wouldn’t be apparent. 

Dumbledore fooled no one inside that room with him. Everyone there knew him well enough at this point. Knew that he didn’t need the glasses he put on the very tip of his nose for show. Knew that the colourful, unfashionable robes and the aloof behaviour were nothing more than a disguise. 

A mask to hide the scheming bastard underneath. 

“Shall we discuss the matter at hand, then?” Dumbledore asked, soft, grandfather-like, fake smile plastered on his face. 

“If you are finished with the sipping, we shall.” Lorcan answered, his voice rough and eyes glistening. He knew it worked when Minerva McGonagall delved a shaky hand inside her robes pocket and Snape’s black eyes flashed in his direction, glistening manically at him. 

Lorcan smirked at the headmaster when that smile faltered. 

Ravenna kept her features scolded in that same expression of boredom, but she placed her hand on his thigh and squeezed it. 

She had loved to get a rise out of the three of them. 

“Very well, then.” Dumbledore waved his hand and the mug he was holding vanished - as did his pretences. “It has come to our attention that young Mr. Nott has been in possession of second year books and he has been seen making use of them during and out of lessons.”

Ravenna sagged against him, if in relief that it was such a simplicity, inconvenience of a problem that dragged them from the comfort of their home or because she just found the trio in front of them a useless waste of their time, Lorcan decided to investigate later. 

“I do believe Theo has.” Lorcan said calmly. “I bought the books for him to read them, after all. It would have been a waste of gold if they were kept at the bottom of his truck.”

“So it is to my understanding that you are aware of your son’s extra-curricular activities.” Lorcan simply nodded. “May I ask why, Lord Nott?”

“You see, headmaster, I refuse to let my son be jeopardised by the weak policy and lack of organisation of this school. My wife and I took it upon ourselves to make sure that Theo has access to what we consider to be the best for him.”

Lorcan kept his tone levelled as he spoke, his voice as pleasant as when he was in the Ministry. He caught the other three by surprise. Minerva was openly gaping at him from her spot, hands going slack where they previously grasped her wand in what she believed to be an indistinguishable way. 

Snape was fuming to the side, his ire making Lorcan want to taunt him more. Taunt him personally. Snape was someone Lorcan would happily burn on a stick and feed his rests to the beasts roaming the Forbidden Forest. Being chained to the headmaster, made to follow orders like a dog and teach the children he so used to love to hate was not nearly punishment enough for what he had done. 

Lorcan took pleasure upon seeing the degraded state the potions master was in every time he saw the man. He loved the way his eyes were hard, unfeeling. The void orbs of a wizard who knew that his unhappiness was deserved. That his disaster of a life was mercifully bestowed upon him. 

Lorcan had what Ravenna called selected empathy. 

Not even a shred of sympathy shone inside him when he took sight of Snape’s hollow cheeks and the fragility of his skin, as if it would disintegrate from his bones if the faintest breeze brushed against them. As if the lightest wind would rip it apart and no potion would be able to heal him. 

Lorcan found it exhilarating that Snape was so deep in self-loathing that he wouldn’t even want to be healed. He enjoyed to watch the man get skinnier and his hair greasier. Enjoyed immensely the knowledge that it was self-inflicted and that he was such a coward, such an obedient puppet of the ageing wizard he was standing behind even now, that he lacked the initiative to do them all a favour and end his excuse of a life. 

And he knew that Ravenna relinquished in it too. Knew that his wife had a place inside her filled with hate for those who had wronged her and that Snape’s name was occupying more of it that the Dark Lord’s ever would be able to.  

Lorcan suspected the other three occupants of the room could read it all in their faces, though. 

Dumbledore, for the first time that night, seemed uncomfortable in his high chair. Nervous. He finally was able to access exactly what it was - who it was - that he had in front of him, and he didn’t like the odds he was left to deal with. 

Snape himself recoiled, probably remembering what Ravenna was more than capable of — with or without a wand — and what Lorcan would do to him after she was finished. 

Minerva sucked in a breath, but what was shinning in her face was grief. Not awareness, not fear, not apprehension and not disgust. Grief. 

And Lorcan also hated her for it. As if she knew half of the reasons one would have to grieve when looking at them. 

“The invitation was for an amicable conversation.” Dumbledore said finally; afraid that the balance on the room would shift if he let the silence stretch for too long and he would lose control of the meeting he instigated. “I plead that we prevent ourselves from provoking things into escalation.” 

Lorcan arched an eyebrow at the same time that Ravenna huffed and, with a hand holding his and the other still positioned on his thigh, she straightened her posture, inching forward. 

Lorcan rested back, his other arm extending along the length of the chair they were sharing as he watched his wife do what she did best. 

Set the circus on fire. 

“It must be killing you to be the first one to crack the facade, headmaster. I honestly thought my presence would set your greasy lackey spinning much sooner than you would lose the strings.” Ravenna said, her tone dripping with mockery and superiority as she crossed her long legs, the slit in her skirts revealing the creamy expanse of bare skin that never failed to make Lorcan wish they were alone in each other’s company. “But I suppose you must be losing your touch after all this time... resting ... inside the walls of this castle.”

Dumbledore’s blue eyes darkened at the insinuation behind her words, but not even the headmaster dared interrupt Ravenna as she arched her perfectly made eyebrow, daring him to contradict her. Showing him that, didn’t matter what he said, her wit would surpass his and she would shame him into admitting his own sins. 

“I do believe we all know that, among us, formalities and illusions of politeness will do nothing to lessen either the awkwardness or the animosity you built so flawlessly.” Ravenna continued, smirking at the end and she pointedly stared at the headmaster and then, slowly, turned her head in the direction of the professors, one at a time. Exactly like a wild feline would do to its prey. “Therefore, I advise you not to waste your old breath - Merlin be blessed if the next one will be the last - in withholding already shattered appearances and tell us exactly why you wanted us here.”

A toast between drunken commoners in the Three Broomsticks would have been heard in the silence that followed as the headmaster tried to regain his footing. 

“Your son’s magical education has become our concern as of late.” Dumbledore said, smartly having decided not to address all the corpses Ravenna had just unburied in seconds inside his own office. “We would like to inquire if there is a specific reason why you and your husband decided to educate Theo in such an advanced manner before he completed the required eleven years of age.”

Ravenna again made her annoyance known by tapping her long fingernails on Lorcan’s thigh, momentarily attracting the eyes of all those in the room. Lorcan swore a shadow of disgust and reprehension passed through the headmaster’s features, but he refrained himself from commenting, deciding to focus back on Ravenna’s face instead. 

She was smirking at him, certainly having noticed that Minerva was blushing slightly under the yellow, dim lights the fireplace offered the room. 

“Theo grew up around magic.” Ravenna started. “And we made it a point to answer all his questions as they came instead of delaying his curiosity until he was old enough to circulate these halls. Also, as I am sure you already know, headmaster, otherwise this meeting wouldn’t have been called in the first place, Theo’s magical core is rather... erratic. Which is why I have been teaching him since an early age.”  

“And do not forget we have been to Hogwarts ourselves, Dumbledore, Ravenna already under your tutelage.” Lorcan completely, not giving them a chance to question what his wife mentioned any further. Adding the bit of information that would cloud the minds of those who thought themselves just so moral, much like the current Hogwarts staff. “We know from experience that the first year curriculum is basic and dull. Thought out to accommodate the clueless Muggle-Borns and Half-Blood students, as well as those ignorant, dependent Purebloods - referring to the likes of the Weasleys, of course. Theo has already mentioned that the two youngest are an embarrassment.”

“So this is about your son being the better wizard?” Dumbledore asked, recoiling back into his chair when Ravenna clicked her teeth at him. 

“No, headmaster.” Lorcan answered. “We taught him in advance for his own good and we bought him the books so he wouldn’t feel discouraged upon coming here and finding out that he was watching a comedy spectacle and started slaking off.”

“If I may,” Minerva speaks for the first time since they arrived, her tone not betraying her trembling, but she was still stiff. Still breathing erratically and still not blinking, “balance has always been of special interest to us. Which was why we thought to call you here to discuss your son.”

“Quite well said, Minerva.” Dumbledore took back the word, eyes flashing again. What Lorcan would give to make this man snap. “Young Mr. Nott has been exceeding all his classes without much effort. The professors - all of them - have brought to my attention that they believe the first year has nothing to offer to your son and we will like to discuss the possibility of hasting the application of his finals and, in the case he does well, forward him a year.”

Lorcan stilled imperceptibly, not wanting to show that the offer caught him by surprise. Ravenna, he noticed, was in a similar state. 

As casually as he could, Lorcan dropped the arm he had on the back of the armchair around her shoulders and squeezed her to him, knowing it was appreciated when she rubbed his leg. 

“Before anything,” Ravenna started “I want you to tell me your motivations, Dumbledore. A number of your students are above first year standards and yet no one has ever skipped it in the last century, if not more.”

“You are correct, Lady Nott.” Minerva said from her place, her rigid stance giving place to the strict teacher about to lecture. Ravenna huffed at that. “But Theo is a rather special case. One, I’m afraid, that we haven’t seen in a very, very long time.”

Ravenna smiled softly. Every mention of the boy she still saw as her little baby turning her to liquid. Rendering even the Ice Queen of Slytherin human. 

“Your son is one of the best talents in Transfiguration I have ever seen in may career as a professor.” Ravenna’s smile vanished, as did the softness with which Lorcan was eyeing her. He brought her body closer to his, relieved when she came willingly. “I believe your lessons covered more ground than even second year does, Lady Nott, and his wand handling is sincerely impressive. We have seen students in their fifth year, about to perform their O.W.L.S, with less control than him. He is a natural.”

Ravenna looked up at him, her steel blue eyes going wide for a split second as the hand she had holding his squeezed it tightly. 

Lorcan knew where she was coming from. Knew that, if there was one thing Ravenna was afraid, was that Theo would be endangered in some way, remote as it might seem. Knew that the interest all the three others in the room were demonstrating for her little boy was too much for her to stand without snapping. 

Lorcan could see she was about to snap and his heart warmed as she let him see it all. Let him calm her down and guide her. 

Ravenna was still looking conflicted when Lorcan caressed her knuckles, over the wedding band she has been using for twelve years now. Never taking it off. 

He nodded his head at her once and, without dropping her gaze, he said to the headmaster “Fetch Theo. This decision affects him the most. He should be the one to make it.”

The room remained silent as Snape wordlessly left to go pick up Theo from the Slytherin common room. 

Lorcan could feel the piercing gaze of the headmaster on the both of them, trying to catch them faltering on a moment of weakness, but his efforts were in vain. One would have to actually know them to catch the signs and, unlike Ravenna, Lorcan wasn’t overly worried. 

His wife, when Theo was concern, has always lost her senses. Her fear has always been too grand, since the moment they discovered she was pregnant and she believed herself not well enough prepared. Since the day her body almost failed her. 

Lorcan felt for her every time the steel of her orbs got just that little bit glassy. Every time her thin lips crisped and her carefully even breathing made her chest stuff more than usual inside her tight dress. 

The palpable relief only he could see on her face as the door opened and steps more rushed than Snape’s sounded on the outside made Lorcan feel lighter and, not even a second later, Theo passed through the door, his smile matching Ravenna’s down to the lopsided left corner. 

Their son ignored the sneer on his Head of House’s face and came closer to them, clad in his pyjamas and only socks on his feet. Dark hair astray on top of his head. Ravenna squeezed Lorcan’s leg one last time before getting up and cradling Theo to her chest, kissing the top of his head repeatedly as she smoothed his wavy strands back into place. 

It warmed Lorcan in an unexpected kind of way every time he saw the two of them together. Every time Ravenna dropped her guard and Theo dropped his infuriating bratty exterior to be hurled together in the little bubble Ravenna created the first time she held their son to her chest right after he was born. 

“Hey, son.” Lorcan said as he got up himself, hand coming to rest on the nape of Ravenna’s neck as Theo flung his arms around his waist as well. Lorcan chuckled as he hugged the boy back. 

He had missed him too, even if only four weeks had passed. 

“I swear they are lying.” Theo said upon letting go of him, pointing to the headmaster and the two professor with his thumb, totally unconcerned. “I’ve broken no rules. I read the rules book and I’ve inflicted on nothing that was written there. If you guys got called here because of misbehaviour, it was done by the professors. And that vulture in the library, Madam Pince, has it out for me.”

Ravenna laughed softly as she smooth Theo’s hair back, hand stopping for a second on his cheeks, demeanour changing as she was surely taken far, far away. 

“The rules book, you say?” She asked. “And how come you came across it, little star?”

Theo smiled cheekily at her her, nuzzling her hand “About that” he said “I might have broken one rule or another to get my hands on it, but nothing to worry about. This school has biggest problems than me breaking into McGonagall’s office. Sorry about that, by the way.” He commented offhandedly to the Transfiguration professor, who only gaped at him. 

“What other problems, son?” Lorcan asked.

“That shinny fool for starters. Lockhart is so incompetent that I wouldn’t be surprise if he drowned in the shower one of these days. It says something about the person who hired him, does it not?” 

Ravenna laughed again, glancing sideways at Dumbledore to complete the jab “Fair enough” she said, guiding Theo to the armchair they were previously occupying and sitting him down, almost on her lap. 

Lorcan positioned himself beside his wife, arm coming around her as he turned back to Theo. 

“Son, we are here to discuss your education.” He started, Theo’s painfully grey eyes staring into his. “The headmaster has agreed to grant you the opportunity to skip the first year, if you can pass the finals earlier.”

“Took them long enough.”

“Now, Theo, I know you have been wishing for something of the sort, but do not make this decision lightly.” Ravenna said. “Keep in mind that the age difference among you and the other students will be, in some cases, more than a year and your Hogwarts experience will be cut short. We can continue to advance your studies on our own if you’d prefer.”

“I don’t really care about that, mom. This year has been a pain in the ass already. Besides, second years can have their own brooms and I will get to share the dorm with Draco instead of those retardeds I wrote you about.” 

“If you are sure, little star.” Ravenna conceded, but Lorcan could see she wasn’t overly content with Theo’s choice. “But do not think for one second that I will allow you to tryout for the Quidditch Team. I won’t have my son passed out for two weeks in the hospital wing after getting a Bludger to the head.”

“Mom, I —”

“Listen to your mother, Theo.” Lorcan interjected. “She won’t let you live it down if you’re the reason she develops premature wrinkles.”

Theo cracked as Ravenna pinched both of them on the side, but never contradicted him. 

“If we could refocus on the matter at hand.” The headmaster cut them, eyeing their interaction curiously. “As I understand, young Mr. Nott accepted the offer. We will start making arrangements for him to sit the exams in a months period, so he has the necessary time to prep - ”

“Can’t I just sit them now?” Theo interrupted him, his drawl cutting Dumbledore’s sentence like a knife cuts flesh and the annoyance came back to the headmaster’s expression. 

“I-I... no, Mr. Nott.” Minerva answered when Dumbledore failed to do so. “Sitting all the exams now wouldn’t be prudent, considering — ”

“Can I do them tomorrow, then?”

“The exams” Snape opened his mouth for the first time that night. He had finally snapped, his voice coming out through gritted teeth that Lorcan knew Ravenna could probably hear grinding together. She was certainly hoping the yellowed choppers would break “cover contents of the entirety of the first year. It would be on your best interest to prepare for it.”

“But you want to test me, right?” Theo asked. “What better way to do it than to test me when I have only my brain as help?”

“You are being foolishly... confident.” Snape remarked, baring his teeth this time. 

Lorcan doubted ‘confident’ was the word he was initially going for. 

“I have plenty of reason to.” Theo shrugged. 

Before Snape could flip and surge forward to grab Theo’s neck in his hands, Lorcan straightened, cleaning his throat “We are all settled, then. Theo will sit the exams tomorrow and I expect word of the results from you, son, and a formal report from the school.”

“Very well.” Dumbledore said. 

“We’re finished here, then.” Ravenna got up. “You’re very welcome for our readiness to come here in such an impolite short notice. And Snape, your escort services are not needed. We are taking Theo back to the common room ourselves.”

Lorcan offered his wife his arm and she took it, smiling at him from under her lashes. Theo accompanied them, chuckling as he pointedly looked at Snape before turning around. 

Lorcan should have known the dislike for the potions master would come on his son’s DNA. 

The way to the dungeons was a short one and, as their small family stopped by the entrance of the common room, Ravenna kneeled in front of Theo, crashing the boy against her. 

“I’m so proud of you, little star.” She said wetly, kissing his cheek longingly. 

“So dramatic, mom.” Theo answered, but he was hugging Ravenna just as tightly. “I miss you too.”

“I know you do.” Ravenna was with actual tears in her eyes now and Lorcan closed his won eyes to tamp the sight. “I-I hear that you’re a talent in Transfiguration. Do you really enjoy it as much as McGonagall seems to think you do?”

“I do, but don’t tell McGonagall that. I don’t want her breathing down my neck more than she already does.” 

“Well… I’m glad you like it.” Ravenna got up, lips quivering. “You should get some sleep now, it’s getting late.” She bent down to kiss Theo’s forehead one last time. “I love you, baby. Sleep well.”

“Love you too, mom.” Theo whispered a password Lorcan couldn’t hear and the care stretch of stone wall opened to revel the green-gloomed room inside. “Night, dad.”

“Good night, son.” He smiled, rolling his eyes as Theo winked playfully at him. 

Lorcan hugged his wife as soon as the wall became impenetrable again, feeling Ravenna go slack against him. 

“I hate Transfiguration.” She mumbled against his chest.

“I know, darling. I know.” Lorcan rocked her for a few moments, knowing that there was no one there but them. “Let’s get you home, love.”

Ravenna was still unusually quiet as they got home. Still lost in her own thoughts as Lorcan took her to their bedroom and, while he changed, he observed her as she simply sat on their bed. Unmoving. 

Wearing only his sleeping pants, Lorcan positioned himself behind her and started undoing the french braid she had bound her ash hair in. 

Lorcan loved her hair. It was so soft, the strands so thin as he unknotted them with his fingers, brushing them away from her face. He had been entranced by the shade since the first time he saw Ravenna. Entranced by her since the first time he saw her smirking in victory at a man four times her age. 

Gently but with propose, Lorcan found the hidden zipper of her midnight black dress and pulled it down, exposing the bare, pale expanse of her back. Following his lead, Ravenna got up and allowed him to pull the fabric down. 

She turned her front to him as the dress pooled around her feet. 

“Were we wrong to let Theo choose for himself?” She asked him, tone vulnerable. 

Lorcan didn’t answer her immediately. He brought his palm to the side of her face and, which a verbless spell, he rid her face of the thin layer of makeup she applied before leaving, revealing her golden freckles. 

Lorcan had told her many times over the years how much he loved that trait of hers. Just how much he found them beautiful. He knew there were exactly seventy three small dots covering the bridge of her straight nose. Fourty three on her left shoulder blade and fifty one on the right one. Ninety seven on her upper back. 

When they married, Lorcan spent a whole night kissing every single one of them while Ravenna slept with her back to his chest, but, as she woke up, she had told him that her freckles were the only part of her body she wished to make disappear. 

It didn’t matter how many times Lorcan insisted that the golden spots made her even more perfect to his eyes, Ravenna still charmed them away as soon as she woke up. 

At night, when she was with her guard down and needing his comfort, were the only times his wife allowed him to cherish them. 

So cherish them he did. 

Before answering her, Lorcan held Ravenna by her hipbones against him, lowering his lips to the first golden freckle atop her shoulder. 

“We didn’t, darling.” Lorcan mumbled against the warmth of her skin. “Theo is well above average. He would waste away in boredom had we done nothing.”

“I can’t help but think that Dumbledore wants something. I can’t... this is just too sudden, Lorcan. Too out of the pattern.”

“Ravenna.” Lorcan called her as her breathing became laboured and the temperature fell. He trailed his lips to the side of her neck, kissing up, relaxing her. And himself. “Listen to me. Dumbledore can do nothing to Theo. He can do nothing to you or me or our daughter. I promise you I will never let anything or anyone harm our children.”

“I know you won’t.” Ravenna said just as quietly, just as gently. “I just worry about Theo. And what he will do with that bat he thinks I don’t know is on his trunk once we send him his broom.”

Lorcan chuckled against her ear, his hot breath so close to one of her sensitive points making her shiver against him, smashing her breasts against the plans of his chest. “Why don’t you let me take your mind off things, darling?”

Ravenna didn’t respond him. 

His wife went on her tiptoes and crashed her mouth to his, opening up immediately after his tongue brushed her lips. Lorcan groaned as Ravenna surrounded him with one of her legs, grinding her dampening cloth-covered cunt against his increasingly stiffening pants. 

In one swift motion, Lorcan used both his hands to grab her round ass, kneading the cheeks with his fingers, aiming to leave his print, before circling her legs around him. Ravenna was ravishing his neck with her hot mouth, tongue finding his pulse point and leaking him torturously slowly as he dropped her on her back on top their covers and climbed over her. 

Lorcan was breathing heavily as he pined Ravenna’s hands to the mattress and caught one of her nipples between his teeth, sucking the pale pink numb until it went rigid inside his mouth and his wife was rendered a moaning mess under him, her legs trying unsuccessfully to kick his pants down his legs. He pulled that same nipple, having Ravenna arching her back just the way he loved. 

Releasing the stiffed nipple with a pop, Lorcan attack her other breast, kissing around the soft flesh, watching it bounce as Ravenna tried to move her hips in sync with his lips. Using only one hand to hold her wrists in place, Lorcan ripped her lace panties from her with a single tug, feeling her heat against his palm. 

Lorcan caressed the moist lips there with the pads of his fingers, grunting his arousal as the squishy sound reached his ears the moment he parted her labia, inserting two of his fingers inside her warm, slippery channel while he circled her clit with his thumb. 

“You... have just... ruined my last black lingerie.” Her voice was breathless, caught in between moans and completely lost as Lorcan chuckled above breast, his breath in contact with the wet skin making her erupt in goosebumps. 

“What are you thinking about now, darling?” Lorcan asked her huskily as he ground his now full erection against her slick entrance, mouth pressed against hers. 

“Only you.” She gasped, long nails scrapping his head as she brough his face closer to hers and kissed him deeply, her tongue interwining with his as her feet successfully kicked his pants down his legs, freeing his erect dick. 

Lorcan chose to believe her as he thrusted his cock inside his wife, body tensing as she moaned his name loudly.  

Chapter Text

Harry’s mood has improved drastically since the night before. 

Granted, Herbology had been a right mess with the mandrakes, the plants they were learning for the next few weeks, making poor Neville, Harry’s dorm mate, pass out due to their endless crying. Defence Against the Dark Arts hadn’t been much better, but, then again, that was expected if one had Lockhart for a teacher. 

His spirits were lifted when, upon arriving at the dungeons, the trio was informed by a portrait that Professor Snape was being held by House matters and wouldn’t be able to lecture any classes that day. 

Harry was needing that break. 

He slept the afternoon away, drapes drawn around his bed shielding him from the outside world and his problems. 

When the time for dinner came, Harry was feeling alive and starved as he met Ron in the common room so they could go to the Great Hall. 

His mood, though, took a downturn once he sat down at the Gryffindor table and the place next to him was taken by a very small, mousy-haired boy who was staring at Harry as though transfixed. The boy was wearing the same tie Harry was and, considering he had never seen him before, Harry assumed he was one of the first years. A Muggle-Born, he guessed, eyeing the Muggle camera the other one was holding tightly with two hands. 

He went bright red when Harry looked at him. 

“Hum, all right, Harry? I’m - I’m Colin. Colin Creevey.” He said breathlessly, moving clumsily to hold up his hand, but yelping when the camera almost fell to the floor. No handshakes, then. “I-I’m in Gryffindor too. Do you think it would be alright if I could take — well, if I could take a picture?” 

“A picture?” Harry repeated, looking at Ron and Hermione — his bushy-haired friend having just arrived, from the library, probably — for support, but finding none. 

Hermione was too fixated on her newly updated schedule — now, there were no hearts around every one of Lockhart’s classes. Not after Ron mocked her for it earlier that day. And Ron was too busy eyeing the chicken breast in front of him as if it was a piece of heaven. 

“So I can prove to my brother that I really met you.” Said Colin eagerly, edging closer to Harry on the bench and smiling wide. “Everyone has told me so much about you. How you survived You-Know-Who’s attack with only a scar. How you saved the whole school last year. And a boy in my Astronomy class told me that if I develop the film just right, I can make all my pictures move.” Harry could only blink at him as the blond boy continued to speak. “I never knew all the things I could do with magic. This is just brilliant, isn’t it?! I want to make a Yearbook — like they do in Muggle schools — and show them all to my dad when I get back home. He is a milkman, you know? He almost didn’t believe it when I received my Hogwarts letter. Thought it was a prank from the neighbours. They are always pranking people. Guess that is something the Wizard World and the Muggle World have in common, right?”

“I-I... yes? I guess so.” Harry didn’t know what he was agreeing to, having lost track of what Colin was saying mid-rant. 

“I got pranked a few times this year. Some missing essays and messing my schedule so I would go to the wrong class.” Colin continued and, while Harry felt pity for him — even a bit of anger on his behalf —, he doubted there was anything that could erase the smile stretching Colin’s face. “I guess Nott doesn’t like the noises of the camera. Or maybe it’s my voice. He did say something about me babbling the blood out of his ears once or twice.”

“Wait.” Harry said. “Nott? Nott is the one pranking you?”

“Well, not just me. Nott pranks lots of people. He pranked Professor Lockhart yesterday, actually. That one was quite funny, though. He made all his portraits turn bald and Lockhart needed Flitwick’s help to reverse whatever it was that Nott did. But that was the first time he got caught, now that I think about it.” Colin continued to speak as if he was telling Harry that the sky was blue and water was wet. As if Nott having a taste for screwing others was nothing major. “But at least I got a break from him today. Nott missed all lessons. We think he might be sick or something.”

Harry let the younger boy talk some more, not interested in the slightest in what he was babbling about now. Had it not been Nott the one to complain about the rants, he would have been inclined to agree that Colin was doing a great job at making his ears bleed. 

As it was, though, he was trying to recall if Malfoy had done anything at all nasty after classes that day and if he had seen Nott. The answer to both those questions was ‘no’. 

Malfoy had spent the whole day unusually silent, brushing away the two goons he liked to parade around with and staying only close to himself. He had made no comments when Ron’s wand - broken, after their encounter with the fighting tree upon arriving at the school - created a disaster every time he dared wield it. The blond prick had said nothing when Hermione stuttered upon being complemented by Lockhart.

Malfoy hadn’t been Malfoy at all that day. 

And Nott. Harry didn’t remember grinding his teeth and feeling the urge to bang his head against a wall upon seeing Nott smoothing his dark hair back in the hallways, as he walked with his shirt untucked and not wearing the robes every student was supposed to wear during lessons. 

He hadn’t seen Nott at all that day. Not even at breakfast. But, then again, he had already noticed that it was a rarity on its own for Nott not to skip the first meal of the day. Maybe he decided to skip all of them that day. 

“Hey, Ron.” Harry called his friend, only half noticing that Colin had now his camera turned in his direction. If the boy was taking his picture or trying to show him something, Harry didn’t particularly care to find out. 

Ron turned to him with his mouth full of food, something — probably the orange sauce used to cook the chicken — dripping from the corners of his mouth. Harry scrunched his nose at the sight but said nothing about it as Ron nodded his head for him to start speaking. 

“You recall seeing Nott at all today?”

“Nope.” Ron answered simply, taking a sip of his pumpkin juice while his mouth was still stuffed with food. 

“Honestly, Ronald, have you got no manners?” Hermione complained besides Ron, her thick eyebrows drawing together in a disgusted grimace. “And to answer your question, Harry, I saw Nott walking with Professor Snape to Headmaster Dumbledore’s office right after breakfast as I was heading to the library for a last-minute study. You two should also consider joining me. I earned Gryffindor ten points today in Herb — ”

“Do you think this has something to do with Nott’s parents being here yesterday?” Harry interrupted Hermione, not in the mood for another one of her lectures. 

She seemed annoyed at him, refusing to speak further. Harry turned to Ron, then. 

“Probably.” His red-haired friend answered him, swallowing fast. “Maybe he really was expelled.”

“Don’t think so.”

“Why not?”

Harry just pointed to the Slytherin table as an answer. 

Malfoy might have been quiet all day long, but he wasn’t visibly bothered. Wasn’t upset. And, with what Harry had gathered and what Ginny had told Ron, he was sure the blond would be close to devastated if his closest friend had been expelled. 

Malfoy wouldn’t be sitting at his house table, soup spoon in hand and nodding along to whatever Zabini was whispering to him. Harry guessed the blond would be moody, snapping at everyone and blaming the headmaster for his friend’s expulsion. 

No. That couldn’t be it. 

Harry was now sure that Nott was up to something. Sure that his parents - his mother - were most probably involved. And he needed to find out what it was before it became too late. 

Harry had been right the day before. Nott hadn’t been expelled. 

In fact, Harry doubted that Nott had even been punished, as Ron had hoped for. 

As they arrived for breakfast, he was surprised to see Nott there, wearing a full uniform - even his tie was done correctly that morning - and talking animatedly with Malfoy as they eyed the opened windows the owls came through every few seconds. 

Harry hadn’t understood much - as hadn’t all the other students eating around them - when four eagle-like owls arrived. Between them, there were two huge packages, one atop the other, which were delivered in the middle of the Slytherin table, right into Nott’s waiting arms. 

“No way!” Ron exclaimed once Nott and Malfoy tore the papers together and a broom was then visible. “How come Nott is allowed to have a broom?! He is a first year, for Merlin’s sake! Why isn’t McGonagall doing anything?”

“Maybe Harry isn’t the only one she opened an exception for.” Hermione commented from behind the thick covers of another one of Lockhart’s books, her tone nonchalant as if she couldn’t care less. 

“But Nott is not even Quidditch material!” Ron continued, gasping as Nott and Malfoy rushed out of the Great Hall with the broom in hand. A newly released broom. Its price was so high that not even Harry would dare spend what he had in his vault to buy it. “Blimey, that broom isn’t even made in England.”

More than one person was in awe as Nott passed. From the other end of the Gryffindor table, Harry could make out Oliver spitting out his juice all over the front of Percy’s robes. 

Harry had seen that broom only in a catalogue before, printed in the imported sections of the magazines. If he wasn’t mistaken, this one was from New Zealand, used by all the beaters of their national team. They were said to be weightless, and more resistant to impact. 

It was a perfect broom, but one would have to know how to handle it. And, if Nott did, then he was, indeed, Quidditch material. 

“You don’t think he is part of the team, do you, Harry?” Ron asked, jealousy already lacing his words. 

“I don’t know.” Harry said sincerely. “Oliver would have said something if Slytherin had someone new. And he would have had a nervous fit if any of them had that broom.” 

“Has he mentioned something about the Slytherins at all? Maybe they’re so bad that Nott is like — a last resource of something.” 

“Nothing that I can recall.” Harry answered, the hopeful look on Ron’s face dissolving into a frown. “I just assumed they have the same team as last year.”

“But that can’t be.” Ron said. “Two of their players were on seventh year last year. They must have at least two positions open.” 

Harry just shook his head. Ron seemed to be more well-informed than he was. 

He just let it go, though. As long as he didn’t also have to deal with Nott on the pitch, he counted it as an advantage. 

Harry frowned at his own thought, though. 

Nott certainly knew who Harry was. He was there, after all, at Flourish and Blotts and Harry had seen the other boy eyeing him. But they had never exchanged words. Harry had never really dealt with Nott. 

Maybe that was his plan, he considered. Make Harry go crazy trying to figure him out. Throw a bunch of disconnected signs for him to put together. Nott could be buying himself and his family time by keeping Harry distracted with brooms and missing classes. 

Such thoughts continued to roam his mind as he stalked after Hermione along the corridors, not bothering to pretend to be listening to Ron ranting still or Hermione questioning their supposed misplaced interest in Quidditch. 

Harry felt like he was operating involuntarily and simply out of pure habit as he entered the Transfiguration classroom and sat down on the second table, between Hermione and Ron and dropped his bag on the floor next to his feet. He didn’t acknowledge the bird perched on a floating branch in front of him and he didn’t notice that the always punctual, strict professor wasn’t waiting for them at the front that day. He didn’t notice that the board beside the big wooden desk at the far end of the classroom held no instructions that day, no drawing of wand movements they were to copy and no lines they were to write down on their pieces of parchment. 

He didn’t realise when the whole class went suddenly silent and Hermione sucked in a too loud breath from his side. 

It took a nudge from Ron’s elbow to his ribs for Harry to come back to reality, his gaze refocusing and his brain catching up with everyone else’s. When Harry turned his head to the direction all eyes were trained upon, was to see Professor McGonagall guiding Theo Nott to the available seat next to Malfoy on the green and silver side of the classroom. 

Nott was still dressed according to the uniform code and, for the first time since Harry has seen him at school, his bag didn’t seem empty as he dropped it indelicately onto the floor. 

Nott had a smirk pulling at his lips, not bothered by the attention bestowed upon him. Harry felt angry at himself for being jealous of that. 

“I have an announcement to make.” McGonagall’s voice echoed in the long, mostly silent room as she halted before them. “As you can see, Mr. Nott is now a part of Hogwarts’ second year and will be sharing classes with you from now on.” Hermione’s nails dug into the surface of the table with such force that she took out wood, her eyes blinking rapidly. Most of the Gryffindors were in a similar state, Lavender Brown actually shrieking her surprise while the Slytherins whispered excitedly among themselves. 

Nott and Malfoy, Harry realised, were as relaxed as ever and he understood why Malfoy had ditched his two goons the day before. Why the blond seemed so content even without making anyone’s life a living hell. 

He had known that his friend would be joining him the very next day. 

And, in a flash, the reason why Mr. and Mrs. Nott were called to the school made sense. The delivery of the broom and the new trunk made sense. 

Nott was now a second-year student. He was allowed to have his own broom. He now needed the Herbology supplies and potion ingredients of the second-year curriculum. He needed new books. 

Nott wasn’t up to anything. His mother wasn’t up to anything. 

Harry had been wrong. Nott was just another rich, unbearable Slytherin who liked pranks. 

“Silence!” Professor McGonagall ordered. “Now I speak to my House alone.” All Gryffindors went quiet, Hermione’s big mud-brown eyes staring at the professor hopefully as if expecting her to rant about how she hated the fact that she had Nott in her class. From the glint in the professor’s eyes, though, Harry assumed Hermione was in for a disappointment. “This development does not concern anyone aside from the faculty and the Notts. I want all opinions to be kept to oneself or else consequences will be issued. Mr. Nott is now a colleague and I expect you to treat him if not well, with either respect or indifference. Have I made myself clear?”

“Yes, Professor McGonagall.” A choir of answers was heard, Harry’s voice in the middle of it without needing his accord. 

McGonagall’s authority was one he didn’t feel comfortable going against. 

“Very well. Now copy the instruction on the board before we begin.” With a wave of the professor’s wand, the previous bare board was filled with instructions written in white. 

As one, the class wetted their quills in the ink bottle and the sounds of the sharp tips brushing parchment filled the room, except for Nott. 

Hermione’s huff was what called Harry’s attention and he found Nott gazing into space, not copying. There wasn’t even an open parchment atop his half of the table. He was dangling his wand in his fingers, looking pensive. 

“This breaks so many school rules.” Hermione hissed angrily next to him, also eyeing Nott sideways every time she lifted her head to read what was on the board. “I’ve read Hogwarts: a Story dozens of times and not once it is mentioned that a student can just — skip a year. And look at him!” Hermione blushed bright red when McGonagall made a shushing noise in their general direction. “Look at him!” She repeated in a whisper. “He has no discipline, no respect. I can’t believe this is happening!” She finished, dismayed. 

Harry didn’t know what to say. Didn’t know if he should attempt to console Hermione or leave her on her own. He opted for the second option, not wanting to risk riling her up any further. 

Ron had no such qualms. 

“You know how it works, Hermione. Don’t act so surprised.” Ron mumbled as he wrote. “Nott comes from a powerful Pureblood family. His father would have to just say the word and he will have anything he wants.”

“Pureblood?” Harry inquired quietly. 

“Families with no Muggle descendants in their lineage, Harry. Merlin!” Hermione said dismissively as she leaned her chest against the table to look directly at Ron. “And whatever do you mean, Ron? The professors would never allow themselves to be undermined by the wills of the likes of Nott.”

“That’s — well — what?” Ron sputtered, finally dropping his quill and turning fully to Hermione, light blue eyes going astray in confusion while trying to focus on Hermione at the same time that he looked out for McGonagall. 

“If you had read Hogwarts: a Story as I told you to, you’d know Hogwarts is an independent organisation. Headmaster Dumbledore doesn’t respond to anyone but himself and, considering that he fought for the light side, he would never be influenced by people like the Notts. There must be another explanation for this.”

“Believe what you want, Hermione.” Ron mumbled angrily. “But you should know by now that gold and family names matter in the Wizarding World. Why do you think there is so much prejudice in the first place?”

“What are you talking about, Ron?”

“Look at that.” Ron snickered at her, a victory smile on his face that Harry knew would send Hermione’s blood boiling. “Seems like your precious Hogwarts: a Story doesn’t have all the answers, after all.”

“Honestly, Ronald, you’re so immature.” Hermione complained, but Ron pretended to be very concentrated on copying the new subject. “Fine. Have it your way. But I’m telling you, there is something wrong here. From all people, Nott shouldn’t be the one to skip a year.”

“Meaning that it should be you, right?” Ron mumbled and, considering that Hermione paid him no mind, just continued to hiss uncomprehendingly under her breath, Harry assumed she hadn’t heard. 

Thank Merlin for small mercies, even if Harry believed Ron to be right. 

“Let’s begin, shall we?” McGonagall stood up and levitated the porcupine to a small stall she positioned in the front of the classroom. “Our goal for the lesson is to transform a porcupine into a pin cushion — as instructed on the board. The spell we are to perform today is not an easy one and it deals with the widest branch of Transfiguration — Transformation. Now, can someone tell me the difficulties one might encounter when performing this spell?”

Hermione’s hands immediately shot into the air before anyone else had a chance and Harry’s friend was given the word.

“Considering the similarities in shape, the Transformation should come easier. According to our book, however, those who cannot visualise the end result will have problems and the wand movement is classified as a level three in the wielding scale, so the correct performance is supposed to be tricky.” Hermione announced proudly, but, before McGonagall could grant the usual two points she tended to give his friend when she recited their book, Nott snorted from his place. 

Hermione flushed — this time most probably in anger —, but McGonagall turned to the dark-haired boy with an arched eyebrow. 

“Anything to add, Mr. Nott?” She asked simply.

“Obviously.” Nott drawled from his spot, tapping his wand on the table while Malfoy snickered to the side. 

“By all means, then.”

“First of all, I have a question.” McGonagall nodded. “How come you wrote on the board that this spell deals only with Transformation, professor?”

Harry thought McGonagall would berate the Slytherin for being so rudely blunt when questioning her methods but was surprised when the professor tilted her head to the side, usual crisped lips curling slightly on the side. 

“Elaborate, Mr. Nott.”

“The base of Transfiguration deals with the alteration of molecule structures. According to what is modified, the spells may be classified.” Nott paused, receiving an encouraging nod from McGonagall. “While this spell does deal with Transformation, there is Conjuration involved as well. A lot of it, actually.”

“That’s quite right, Mr. Nott.” McGonagall said. She was actually impressed. “Care to explain to the class how you arrived at this conclusion?”

“Transformation entails that the basic structure is rearranged to form something new. That’s not the case. This spell turns an object into a living thing, which means that a new molecular structure has to be created for the new organism to function. The similarities start and end on the pins, which will be turned into the spines.” 

“How would you answer my previous question, then?”

“Incompetence would be a challenge, I suppose.” Nott said, smirking. “The wand movement is a rather simple one and, considering that you made it so easy, Professor, the weight shouldn’t be a variable to consider.”

“Explain, please.” McGonagall asked, openly smiling now. 

“It makes sense that the weight and the wand movement are connected, doesn’t it? You adjust the wand movement according to the weight of the caster, so the math is exact and the rebuilding of the molecules can start.” Nott pointed to the board with his wand. “You wrote the angle we gotta incline the wand, which indicates that you calculated already our average high and weigh for this specific spell, hence how you made it so easy for us to get it right by just repeating the movement. Therefore, there are only a few ways this spell can go wrong: either someone is out of the speculated mistake range of the calculation — apologies in advantage Goyle, you are too fat to perform this spell correctly —” 

“Mr. Nott!” McGonagall reprehended, but Nott just shrugged.

“One might have trouble with the Configuration variation and won’t be able to envision the end result, which will mean that the pins will turn into spikes, but the cushion won’t become an animal. Some people here might be super incompetent and let their minds wander, so both the concentration and the viciousness factors will fail. Or somebody’s wand can simply not be powerful enough for the mixed branches of Transfiguration, so the spell won’t work properly.”

“Terrific.” McGonagall commented, coming closer to the table Nott occupied with Malfoy. She eyed his wand for a second, then her gaze held his. Harry was surprised when Nott simply stared back at her, unblinkingly. “Do you know which wands are the most adapt?”

“Not particularly.”

“How did you come to such a conclusion, then?”

“Lots of people often ignore that one variable for successful Transfiguration is the wand power.” Nott said and Harry’s head was already spinning at that point. McGonagall’s classes had never been such as this one. No class had been. The professors had always given them the information, questions being few and far between with the sole goal of accumulating House points. It never went beyond the textbook. Not like McGonagall and Nott were doing right then. “Wands have profiles which best fit the wizard they choose, but they also have magical inclinations. The core and wood of a wand matter with Transfiguration because it is one of the kinds of magic that require the most, so the wand has to be able to stand and comprehend what is being done.”

“What’s your wand made of?” McGonagall asked curiously. 

“Yew wood and dragon heartstring.” 

“A wand very good for Transfiguration, indeed.” McGonagall commented almost to herself, before turning back to Nott. “Do you have a formed opinion on this matter, Mr. Nott?”

“Yes.”

“Would you care to share it?”

“Unicorn hair is weak.” Nott said simply, to the outrage of many of their peers. “They are safe. They perform all types of magic mediocrely, never exceeding in any specific field. I bet those with the hair on the core of their wands won’t be able to perform the spell today. The woods more commonly found in healing also are not fit for Transfiguration. The base of healing is to cure what is already there. Restore, not rearrange or create. Those with those kinds of wands will probably never be able to muster switching or Human Transformation.”

“What do you say to Untransfiguration?” McGonagall seemed almost giddy as she asked the question, leaning forward as if Nott’s answer would determine forever what she thought of him. 

“I think is kind of a joke, really.” Nott shrugged. “There is only one spell there — Reparifarge — and it’s not all that useful.”

“Do elaborate.”

“This is more of a reverse spell than anything. If you multiply things, for example, the spell will not work. You will have to vanish what you don’t want. I assume the spell only turns things back to their original state one spell at a time. By multiplying, you are conjuring a copy. The initial state is, in these circumstances, existence out of thin air. The spell wouldn’t work. See an Animagi, for example. You use the spell on them while they are in their animal form and they go back to being human, but their composition — what makes them transform at will in the first place — remains unchangeable, because the Transfiguration happened so within their bodies, that it became part of them. There is nothing to return back once the ritual is completed.” 

Animagi? 

Ritual? 

Harry was completely lost and, judging by the spaced-out expression on Ron’s face and the snap sound of Hermione’s quill breaking in half in her iron-like hold, he doubted he was the only one. 

McGonagall, though. She was staring at Nott as if her class had a new meaning. As if she had just found a reason to continue to lecture them every morning. 

“I’m sincerely impressed, Mr. Nott. Your assumptions are all correct.” And she did look impressed. She looked almost giddy. “You came around to them by yourself or did you have help?”

“By myself. My mom doesn’t care much for Transfiguration.” 

“I recall that she doesn’t.” McGonagall answered simply. “How did you deduce the weigh correlation with the wand movements? There haven’t been many published pieces of research in that area.”

“As much as mom hates everything to do with this class, she does have some books on the house about it. One of them speculated about the fifth variable for successful Transformation and how it might not be a new factor, but the junction of two existent ones. After I used dad’s wand to multiply bubbles while my mom was having a bath and, even though I did the exact movement dad taught me, the bathroom floated, I thought that perhaps my weight had been the problem.”

“Did you solve it by yourself after?”

“Yeah.” Nott smirked. “Had to test it on my sister’s dolls, though. Mom forbade me from entering the bathroom with a wand after I ‘ruined her hair with bath oils’.” 

McGonagall chuckled low in her throat as she stepped back behind the stall “Forty points to Slytherin, Mr. Nott. Now, draw your wands. Let’s begin!”

The lesson followed mostly in silence that day. The Slytherins were still basking in their newfound glory and the Gryffindors were too out of place to do much else. 

Harry could do nothing but watch as Nott won his House fifteen more points before the bell rang indicating the end of classes that day. He had watched as Hermione’s eyes lined with actual tears as Nott perform the spell perfectly on his first try and was able to pinpoint the mistakes of three other students. 

He didn’t know what to think. Didn’t know what to make of the fact that Nott, even though still an arrogant bastard, was insanely smart. 

He didn’t want to admit that maybe, just maybe, Nott had skipped a whole year because he was really well above everyone else. 

For a moment there, Harry couldn’t help but compare the two of them. He wondered if, had he been raised by his parents, and been immersed in magic since the beginning, he would be able to access the functioning of enchantments as Nott did. Wondered if he would also be so curious about magical theory that he would read forgotten books he found in the house and experiment on his mother’s bath. 

The truth was that he doubted he would. Harry was weirdly sure that, had he grown up in a magical household, he would still be as ignorant as Ron. 

But he did like to think that he would care more than his friend did. While Harry’s head was swirling with unanswered questions from their lesson, Ron was still fixated on the fact that Nott may or may not be part of the Slytherin Quidditch Team while the red-head hadn’t been good enough to pass the tryouts. 

At least Ron got his answer as they left McGonagall’s classroom. 

Nott and Malfoy were walking ahead of them, with their heads pressed together as they spoke in tones too quiet for Harry to listen. At least until Nott untangled himself in order to take off his tie. 

“Nah, it won’t do any good to even try talking to him.” Nott was saying as he untucked his shirt from his pants. “Mom doesn’t want me on the team until I turn at least fourteen.”

“Fourteen? Why?” Malfoy asked, his drawl excited in a way that Harry had never heard before. He guessed he just never associated the blond with normal human behaviour. 

“Something about not wanting me to pass out for two weeks after a Bludger hits me on the head.”

“That’s awfully specific. Even for you mom.”

“I know.” Nott chuckled a bit, taking off his robes now. “She didn’t answer me when I asked, but I think this may have happened to dad when he played, so she doesn’t want it happening to me.”

“Why would she send you the broom, though?”

“For me to fly, of course.” Nott threw his hair back, the rather long strands almost hitting Harry in the face as he walked a bit too close to continue to hear them. “We could go now even. We have a free period, don’t we?”

“I don’t think we are supposed to fly on school grounds, Theo, and Ravenclaw has the pitch for the rest of the afternoon.”

“I wasn’t talking about the school grounds.” Harry swore he could hear Nott’s smirk. “Did you know that the lake is not technically part of Hogwarts? It was there before the castle was even built.” 

“You don’t mean —”

“Yeah, I do. Come on, Draco. They can’t even punish us without looking bad themselves.” 

“We will be the first to ever actually do it.” Malfoy muzzled. 

“It makes it more appealing, doesn’t it?” Nott taunted him, shoulder crashing against Malfoy’s and Harry was again surprised by how tall Nott actually was for his age. 

“Oh, sod it. Let’s do it!” Malfoy beamed.

With that, the two Slytherin sprinted down the hallway, no doubt going to fetch their brooms so they could go flying above the Black Lake. 

“Blimey.” Was the only thing Ron said and, wordlessly, Harry agreed with his friend.

It was a shame that Harry could see the lake from the window of Gryffindor tower. 

He and Ron hadn’t been able to do much with the rest of their afternoon. Not with the sight of Nott and Malfoy doing laps and flips nonstop until it was dinner time. 

The sight of the two of them taunted them. Malfoy’s bright blond hair had been a lighthouse against the dark waters, impossible to miss. And, as a contrast, Nott had been the dark spot against the clear sky. 

In a moment of pettiness, Harry thought about going back to McGonagall’s classroom and telling her that her new favourite student was hanging upside down from his broom outside, but he rejected the idea as fast as it came. 

Nott was no new Hermione. Everybody knew that, as much as he was smart, the Slytherin was also a troublemaker. Harry doubted McGonagall wasn’t aware of what her prodigy did in his spare time. 

It made Nott’s presence all the more bitter, though. 

His own Head of House was favouring a snake. A snake had been the talk of the lion’s common room the whole day, be it because he aced all classes that day or because he beat Fred and George in the numbers of pranks in the first month. 

It made Harry incredibly bitter that he had no reason to suspect Nott anymore. 

Harry didn’t want to be talked about. He was tired of fame as it was, but he was jealous that Nott was so much better than him. From what he had seen, the Slytherin was even good at flying. It made Harry jealous that Nott gave people a reason himself to be stared at, to be commented on. 

No one seemed to remember that his father had been a Voldemort follower. No one ever remarked about his mother’s clouded past. No one apparently cared that he had just as much gold as the Malfoys and probably also lived in a manor. 

Nott was the recent talk of the school because he skipped an entire year; because he had rendered McGonagall speechless in her own classroom; because he had dared put his broom on his shoulder and march side by side with Malfoy to the Black Lake, where they took off flying. 

Nott was simply cool. He wasn’t the owner of a scar; the one who almost died to protect the Sorcerer’s Stone or the baby who defeated the darkest of all wizards because his mother decided to die in his place. 

He just was. 

At least, Harry consoled himself, he wasn’t the only one feeling out of place. 

Ron had been amusing to watch as he sputtered while trying to argue that Nott had cheated during class. That there was no way that he was smart at all. 

Hermione, though. She had still to calm down from the mess she was after returning from her talk with McGonagall. 

His petite, bushy-haired friend had arrived crying in the common room. Hermione just sat herself between Harry and Ron on the couch and buried her head on Harry’s shoulder, shaking. 

“I asked Professor McGonagall how Nott did it.” She had hiccuped against his robes. “She said that he sat the exams for first years and aced all of them. I—I asked her if I could do the same, but she told me that Nott’s a very special case. She called him incredibly bright and that, unlike the other students, the first year had nothing to offer him that he didn’t already know. She doesn’t think I’m as good as him!” 

It had been sad to watch Hermione breaking down and, as much as Harry and Ron wanted to make her feel better, they had no real words of consolation. 

They couldn’t lie to her. It just wouldn’t be fair. 

They couldn’t tell her that Nott had no merit because now he had proved that he did. They couldn’t tell Hermione that she was better than him, because even her favourite professor made it clear that that wasn’t the case. They couldn’t tell her that tomorrow would be better, because they knew Nott would be there as well, ready to mock them with a single smirk and snort all their answers down the drain. 

So they remained silent. The three of them — together — gazing out of the window and trying to understand exactly who — what — was Theo Nott and how he and Draco Malfoy seemed to hit it off just so.

Chapter Text

Harry was exhausted that morning. 

He didn’t sleep well the night before — or at all. He still didn’t know for sure if tossing and turning endlessly with his eyes closed and half drowned in a slumber could be considered actual sleep. 

It was a shame that he could still dream in such a state, though. 

He woke up more than once with sweat dripping down his spine, gasping for clean air to fill his constricting lungs. He had seen it when he closed his eyelids. Seen what he supposed was the agglomeration of Voldemort’s followers descending from the sky as if they were a blanket of shadows obscuring the world. And in the centre of it, was Nott’s mother, wearing a crown of bones and using her wand to lit a green light. 

The same green light Harry had dreamed of the year before. The green light he assumed had been fired at him by Voldemort and gave him his lightning scar. 

Harry knew none of that was actually real — or at least, he didn’t think so. But still, the fresh image of Mrs. Nott, her lips painted crimson as she curled her mouth at him in the middle of Hogwarts — a place where Harry felt happy, safe —, had been too much for him. Too terrifying; and his need to know who she killed, how she met her husband and why so many were so nervous when she was around, chased any shred of peace he had away. 

He was actually glad that Oliver Wood had scheduled a training session so early that morning. It gave Harry something else to focus on and it gave him an excuse to get out of bed, to leave the vivid nightmare he had had behind. 

But he guessed he should have been quieter while getting ready if he wanted to bask in the stillness of the morning before he was to drown in the new tactics plan, Oliver came up with.

Ron woke up as Harry was fumbling with the contents of his truck while looking for his gloves, and decided to watch training that morning — much like he had been doing since he failed the tryouts. 

Had it been Harry the one anxious to be part of the team, he would have observed whenever he could as well, but he didn’t think it was the right move for Ron. His friend always got moody after spending hours at the stands, unable to join in on a broom. Ron always got snappy and Harry and Hermione had to spend the next hours calculating what they were going to say around him, so Ron wouldn’t bite their heads off. 

Ron would hear none of his reasoning, though. Wouldn’t accept the offer to have Harry detail to him all the strategies Oliver liked the best and the tips he was given. So, Harry just sighed and went to the common room with a sleepy Ron trailing behind him. 

They exited the stairs to the round room to find Hermione curled up on the armchair, she had declared hers the day before, a book opened on her lap and dry drool at the corner of her slightly open mouth. 

Judging by the uniform she was still wearing, Harry knew that the girl hadn’t gone to her dorm the night before. Hermione had insisted on studying when Harry and Ron had headed to bed; she had insisted that she could win just as many points as Nott could, that she could ‘analyse’ theories better than the Slytherin, even if she didn’t have the supposed privileges Hermione thought Nott did for being born in a magical family. Never mind that Ron was just the same. 

Harry felt a bit bad for her. Hermione had confided in him once that she wasn’t the best at making friends. That her attentiveness towards her studies — as she put it at the time — had been off-putting to basically all of her peers. So she made school her safe heaven. School was something she understood and something she was undoubtedly good at. 

And now that someone was going toe to toe with her — with so much less effort — was driving her mad. 

Harry had planned to sneak out as quietly as he possibly could, waking Hermione the last thing he wanted to do when she appeared to be more exhausted than him, even while still sleeping. But Ron’s sleep-clouded brain didn’t get the memo, and his friend collided full force with the small, wooden side-table closest to Hermione. 

Their bushy-haired friend woke up in fright, book falling and brown eyes wide as she tried to locate the source of the noise. 

Harry insisted that she should sleep more, but she had none of it. 

So, now he was heading to the Quidditch pitch with a small party of his own.

The sun was still hidden in misty clouds as they stepped into the grounds. Whispers of the winds that sang during the night brushed strands of his black hair away from his face and sent a shiver through his warm body. 

Leaves were starting to fall from the trees, their colours not green anymore, but stained with the yellow of Scottish autumn. Harry smelled the air, the musky scent calming down his nerves as he lead the way to the far away rings signalling the pitch from a distance. 

The clean, fresh weather had smoothed his mood somehow. The white sun — not so hot against his skin — was ideal, and the breeze prevented him from suffocating on his own skin. 

Today was a good day to fly. The perfect opportunity to take the edge off. 

The Gryffindor Team was already assembled as Harry arrived; the players were all rubbing the tiredness out of their eyes as they gathered around Oliver’s straight form. The captain was using his wand to point things on a floating board and he was the first one to notice Harry as he came closer. 

“There you are, Harry, what kept you?” Oliver was buzzing with energy as he said it, not giving Harry time to retort before he made one of the red arrows Harry supposed were their Chasers cross to the other end of the board. “I’m running over this new training program I want perfected before the match against Slytherin.”

Quidditch was a rather simple game, but, somehow, Oliver’s schemes always made Harry doubt his ability to understand the sport. There were three Chasers, two Beaters, one Keeper and one Seeker. The Chasers had to pass the Quaffles among themselves and try to score a goal in one of the three rings, the Keeper of the other team was protecting. The Beaters were to protect the Chasers and cause trouble to their adversaries by swinging their bats against two other balls called Bludgers. And the Seeker — Harry — was to catch the smallest and fastest of all the balls — the Golden Snitch. Once he did it, his team earned 150 points and the match came to an end. 

At least, that was what Harry kept repeating to himself while Oliver made the arrows and the lines move around the board incessantly, his voice coming out so fast that Harry could barely make out the words he was saying. 

At least he wasn’t the only one. 

Angelina Johnson was nodding her head at nothing, blinking slowly every time Oliver said her name. Fred was resting his head against George’s shoulder, who in turn was leaning against a struggling Alicia Spinnet. The two redheads were actually snoring. 

Ron seemed to be the only one paying any kind of real attention and Harry could give his friend that. 

The first board took nearly twenty minutes to ‘explain’, but there was another, bigger, more colourful one after that, and a third only for Harry under that one. 

“So,” Oliver’s voice pulled Harry from the stupor he had gone into, his mind having just reminded him that he was about to train for hours on end without having eaten anything. He just hoped he wouldn’t pass out and, if he did, he hoped someone was awake enough to catch him before he crashed onto the ground. “Is that clear? Any questions?”

“I’ve got a question, Oliver,” yawned George, his brown eyes glassy, as if he was still dozing off. “Why couldn’t you have told us all this yesterday when we were awake?”

Oliver wasn’t pleased. He had a single mantra. Never mess with Quidditch. 

They had all kind of done just that by napping his instructions into oblivion. 

“Now, listen here, you lot, we should have won the Quidditch Cup last year. We’re easily the best team. But unfortunately — owing to circumstances beyond our control — ”

Harry stared at the floor, knowing everyone must be looking at him. He still felt guilty — somewhat guilty, at least. 

He had been unconscious in the Hospital Wing after his confrontation with Voldemort and saving the Sorcerer’s Stone, meaning he couldn’t be there for the final match of the year. Gryffindor had to go into the field missing their seeker and had suffered their worst defeat in three hundred years. 

Oliver seemed to still be tortured over it, though. His first year as a captain hadn’t gone slightly as he expected — as Harry also imagined that accepting a first-year player with zero experience with flying a broom had also been a jab to his mental stability. 

Someone — thankfully — coughed and Oliver regained his composure, “So this year, we train harder than ever before. Let’s go!”

They all shot up in the air with their broom, Harry racing the twins upwards until they settled in their positions, waiting for Oliver to vanish his many boards and release the balls. Harry took this moment to search for Ron and Hermione, finding them sitting comfortably in the stands, Ron unblinking absorbing all of their moves while Hermione stubbornly reopened her book and read the pages at a pace that Harry could only describe as furious, judging by the way her head bobbed as she moved along the printed lines. 

“What’s that funny clicking noise?” Fred asked from beside him, eyes roaming the pitch and apparently finding nothing. 

“Look this way, Harry! This way!” Harry groaned as he recognised the shrinking voice of Colin Creevey and finally spotted the small blond dot jumping up and down a few feet away from his two friends. 

“Who’s that energetic little fellow?” George asked.

“No idea.” Harry lied, putting on a spurt of speed that took him as far away as possible from Colin and his flashing camera. 

“What’s going on?” Oliver called, frowning. “Why is that first year taking pictures? I don’t like it one bit. The Slytherins could have paid him off to spy for them and find out about our new training program. I definitely wouldn’t put it above Flint.” 

“He is in Gryffindor.” Harry replied quickly, not wanting poor Colin to be on the end of one of Oliver’s rants. 

“And the Slytherins don’t need a spy, Oliver.” Said Fred.

“What makes you say that?” Asked Oliver, frown deepening. 

“Because they came to appreciate us in person.” George said cheekily, pointing into the distance. 

And there, right where George’s finger was indicating, were several people stalking into the field, their dark green and silver uniform a contrast against the clean morning. 

Oliver lead the way to the ground — Harry and the twins coming right behind him — and he staggered upon landing, the impact too hard on his knees amidst his rage to get there as fast as he could. 

“Flint!” Oliver bellowed at the Slytherin captain. Harry didn’t like how unconcerned the older boy looked. “This is our practice time! We got up specially! You clear off now!”

Harry had no real idea in which year Marcus Flint was even in, but he supposed he might be a year away from finishing Hogwarts. The guy was even bigger, broader than Oliver himself. His face smirking trollishly as he stared Oliver right in the eye “Plenty of room for all of us, Wood.”

Angelina, Alicia and the third chaser, Katie Bell, had just arrived, and now the two teams were meeting head-on in the middle of the field. Tension was flaring and Harry gulped at the intimidating sight the snakes — to his dismay — were able to make. All their players were males, most of them resembling beasts as they stood shoulder to shoulder. 

“But I booked the field!” Oliver cried out in rage, his face reddening. 

“Oh, in that case,” Flint’s smirk widened and Harry fought the urge to face palm. After years of living under the same roof as Dudley Dursley, he knew exactly when he was walking into a trap. And his team had done just that, “here. I’ve got a specially signed note from Professor Snape. ‘I, Professor Snape, give the Slytherin team permission to practice today on the Quidditch field owing to the need to train their new Seeker.’”

“You’ve got a new Seeker?” Oliver was already calculating as he asked, and Harry had half a mind to feel pity for himself. They probably would have another round with the boards after this. “Who?”

And from behind the six large figures before them came a seventh, slightly leaner and smaller boy, his pointy face smirking as the sun made his blond hair shine white. 

Harry groaned upon catching sight of Draco Malfoy. 

So much for a morning of flying. 

“Aren’t you Lucius Malfoy’s son?” Asked Alicia, staring at Malfoy with dislike. Her glare was mirrored by the Weasley twins, who seemed ready to jump Malfoy’s bones. 

Harry would have liked to see that. He wouldn’t have blamed Fred and George if they did it either, not after the part both Malfoy and his father played in humiliating the Weasleys in the middle of Flourish and Boots.

“Funny you would mention Draco’s father,” Flint — and his whole team — were smiling brightly. The sight was terrifying, completely out of place in their evil-like, Slytherin green-clad bodies. “Let me show you the generous gift he’s made to the team.”

Harry’s eyes widened out of their sockets, then. He had seen only glimpses of that broom in the Quidditch shop on Diagon Alley. Their newly-released status and their extremely expensive price scared the owners into displaying them where children’s greedy fingers couldn’t touch the shiny hairs at the end of the broom. 

Harry had thought vaguely if he should maybe order it while he skimmed through the Quidditch catalogue Fred had forgotten in the kitchen when Mrs. Weasley shoed him out of the house to rid her peonies of gnomes. He had backed down, though. His broom was in perfect condition and he didn’t understand much about them in the first place to even begin to explain why the Nimbus 2001 was so much better than the Nimbus 2000 that he had. 

Harry had decided that flaunting was not worth it. But a pinch of regret curled on his stomach as he saw the seven Slytherin players holding highly polished broomsticks each, their brand-new black handles spelling Nimbus Two Thousand and One in a set of fine golden letters which gleamed under the Gryffindoors’ noses, taunting them. 

Flint smirked at the stunned, almost nauseous look on Oliver’s face, “Very latest model. Only came out last month.” He said carelessly, as if it was nothing, flicking a speck of dust from the end of his own and making it a show as he threw the invisible particle of dust towards Angelina. “I believe it outstrips the old Two Thousand series by a considerable amount. As for the old Cleansweeps” — Flint smiled nastily at Fred and George, who were both clutching worn-out Cleansweep Fives — “sweeps the board with them.” 

Oliver sputtered his dismay low in his throat and, for the first since Harry has met the twins, not even Fred and George had anything to say. 

Harry focused on Malfoy, hating the flicker of a smirk he could see twisting the blond’s thin lips. It hadn’t been there when his father was being praised, but it was widening now, as his light grey eyes stared beyond where Harry was standing with the Gryffindor team. 

Harry didn’t like what he saw there. The glint of excitement that had alighted itself on Malfoy’s eyes. Excitement with a hint of both victory and malice. 

“Oh, look!” Flint exclaimed dramatically, glancing at the point Malfoy was still looking at. “A field invasion.”

Harry finally turned around and found Ron and Hermione crossing the grass in rushed steps, their expressions twisted in eagerness and worry to see what was going on. 

“What’s going on here?” Ron asked Harry, ignoring the way Alicia glared at him when he passed through her as if she wasn’t even there. “Why aren’t you training? And what in Merlin’s name is he doing here?”

His friend was ogling Malfoy with poorly veiled envy, taking in the blond’s green and silver robes — attesting to Malfoy’s position on the Slytherin Quidditch Team.  

“I’m the new Slytherin Seeker, Weasley.” Malfoy answered, his voice coming out as a smug drawl which ignited the anger inside Harry. “Everyone’s just been admiring the brooms, father bought our team. He’s quite the… Quidditch enthusiast, see.”

Ron’s face reddened as he gaped, open-mouthed, at the seven broomsticks held tall in front of him. 

“Good, aren’t they?” Malfoy taunted. “But perhaps the Gryffindor team will be able to raise some gold and get new brooms, too. I suggest you raffle off those Cleansweep. I expect a museum would bid for them — or, who knows, maybe a sanitary agency.”

Harry seethed as the Slytherin team howled with laughter. 

“At least no one on the Gryffindor Team had to buy their way in.” Hermione said sharply, coming to stand in front of a still gobsmacked Ron. She looked so tiny among the players; so tiny as she had to tilt her head up to look Malfoy in the eyes. But Harry smiled smugly as she held her head up in victory, glancing with disdain at the broom in Malfoy’s hands. “They got in on pure talent.”

Harry was snickering to the side, clapping Hermione on the shoulder as she blushed before the approving Gryffindor Team when he stopped. He had expected Malfoy to flip. Had expected the blond to throw a tantrum and threaten to call his daddy to defend his bruised pride. 

But the blond just… stood there, smugness still radiating out of him and his smirk widened. He continued to look at Hermione until her smile faltered; until she took a step backwards, closer to Harry’s side. 

“No one asked your opinion, you filthy little Mudblood.” He spat. 

Harry was confused, but he immediately knew Malfoy had said something really bad. There was an instant uproar after the words left his mouth. More than one growl of rage, more than one player having to hold back the ones next to them. 

Malfoy was still smirking as he carefully step aside when Fred and George jumped on him just as Alicia shrieked, “How dare you!” and Ron plunged his hands into his robes, pulled out his crooked wand and yelled at the top of his lungs, “You’ll pay for that one, Malfoy!”. 

Malfoy chuckled before the tip of the wand glistening inches away from his face, waving lazily, expectantly at it. 

“Ron, stop!” Harry tried, but it was too late already. 

His friend had played right into Malfoy’s hand, and Harry understood what the blond had planned only a mere second later. 

A loud bang echoed around the stadium and a jet of pale green light shot out of the wrong end of Ron’s wand, hitting him in the stomach instead, and sending him reeling back backwards onto the grass. 

“Ron!” Hermione squealed, desperation in her tone as she skittered to where Ron still laid unmoving, only groans coming from him. “Ron, are you alright?!” 

Harry winced at the yellowish twinge that had overtaken Ron’s complexion, his freckles like reference dots on his nose and cheeks. His friend opened his mouth to speak as Hermione kneeled next to him, but no words came out. Instead, Ron gave an almighty belch and several slugs dribbled out of his mouth and onto his lap — alive, squirming and glistening slugs. 

Harry felt nauseous at the sight. 

The Slytherin team was paralysed with laughter. Flint was doubled up, hanging on his new broomstick for support. Malfoy had fallen on all fours, banging the ground with his fists as he inspired junks of air at a time, “This is so much better than I’d imagined!” He managed to say through gasps. 

The Gryffindors had gathered around Hermione’s and Harry’s hunched forms, none of them seemed willing to touch Ron, who was still vomiting moving slugs. 

“Oh my God! Oh my God! Oh my God!” Hermione kept repeating, her hands brushing her hair away from her face franticly as she turned wide brown eyes to Harry. “Oh, Harry! We must take him to the Hospital Wing right away!”

“No!” The twins yelled in unison, Fred continuing, “Madam Pomfrey can’t know Ron tried to attack Malfoy. Mom would kill him.”

“That’s unimportant!” Hermione spat. “Ron needs a healer. We don’t know if the slugs have poison, or if there will be after effects, or… or — We are losing time! We must go!”

“Calm down, Hermione!” Harry snapped at her, his head throbbing with the noises. He couldn’t think straight. Ron was still puking, the Slytherins were still laughing and Hermione hyperventilating wasn’t helping him either. From the distance, he saw smoke coming out of a small hut. “We’d better get him to Hagrid’s, it’s nearest.” He said to Hermione, who nodded reluctantly, helping him as Harry started pulling Ron up by his arms. 

“What happened, Harry? What happened? Is he ill? But you can cure him, can’t you?” Malfoy laughed louder as Colin, who had apparently run down from his seat and was now dancing alongside them, asked Harry. 

At that moment, Ron gave another huge heave and five more slugs dribbled down his front. 

“Oooh,” said Colin, fascinated and raising his camera. “Can you hold him still, Harry?”

“Get out of the way, Colin!” Harry told him angrily as he and Hermione supported Ron out of the Quidditch pitch and across the grounds towards the edge of the forest. 

“Nearly there, Ron.” Hermione reassured their friend wetly, “You’ll be alright in a few minutes — we’re almost there —” 

The three of them stumbled when Harry suddenly stopped. 

The way to Hagrid’s cabin was deserted at that time of the morning, only the chirping of birds and the echo of the waters of the Black Lake to be heard. The deafening silence was the reason why the amused, bark-like chuckle coming from behind the thick trunk of a tree startled Harry so much. 

Theo Nott was leaning against it, his black hair falling over his face as he dangled his wand in between his fingers. On the floor, Harry noticed the pieces of parchment stained in black ink, filled with doodles, astray notes and what Harry thought were calculations. His eyes widened slightly behind the lenses of his glasses when he caught sight of the cover of the book Nott was unashamedly writing on: Theories of Transubstantial Transfiguration. 

That was an advanced book. Harry had seen it on the shelves of the bookstore in Diagon Alley the year before, in a section designed for masters of that branch of magic. 

He could hear Hermione sucking in a breath beside him, an angry frown forming on her face as Nott arched an eyebrow at her. He looked like his mother when he did that. 

“You Gryffindors are pathetically predictable.” Nott drawled lazily, one of his hands now inside his pocket. His expression never changed as Ron puked another four slugs, but Harry noticed the amusement shining in the silver orbs. 

“Get out of the way, Nott!” Harry said through gritted teeth, which earned him an unconcerned look from the other boy. 

“You’re the ones who stopped, Potter.” Nott remarked, his smugness increasing as Harry visibly clenched his jaw. “I was merely watching Weasley’s sluggish performance.” 

“Let’s just go, Harry.” Hermione told him pointedly, pushing Ron forward. “He is not worth our time.”

Nott noticed Harry's hesitation. He didn’t want to leave; least of all when it would seem he was just following Hermione’s orders — which he was already mocked for. Harry didn’t want Nott to think he had won, that Harry would back away from him. 

“By all means.” Nott waved at them teasingly. Harry huffed, starting to move as Ron heaved again, when Nott continued, “A piece of advice, though — that big oaf will never be able to solve Weasley’s swallowing problem. He would need at least one working brain cell for that — and a wand, of course.”

Hermione was the one who stopped, then, furiously turning to Nott — who didn’t even bother to spare her a glance, “Oh, and you would?” She asked. 

Nott stared at them as if it should be obvious. And Harry felt ashamed when a muffled voice in his head warned him that Nott was right and it actually was. 

Hagrid couldn’t do magic. He had told Harry himself. He had said he didn’t finish his studies, and that he wasn’t even allowed to own a wand. Chances were that Hagrid would be just as lost as Harry was. 

“Yes.” Nott answered simply, making Hermione sputter. He mockingly batted his long eyelashes at her, and Harry was surprised to see his friend blush. “But you’ll have to ask me nicely, Granger.” 

“Forget it!” Hermione snapped, shaking her head from side to side for emphasis as Ron made a noise of protest before puking again. The intervals between heaves were shortening. “You are no more capable than I am, Nott. I will find the answer in the library and fix Ron myself.” She finished resolutely. 

“Be my guest.” Nott shrugged, turning his back on them. “But do tell if the slugs start coming out of other places, will you? I’ll have that annoying twit Creevey take a picture and send it to the student body as an early Christmas gift.”

“You slimy son of — ” Ron never finished insulting him, though. Three more slugs fell from his mouth and onto the floor — bigger in size than the last ones. 

Ron was getting much, much worse. And increasingly fast. 

Harry swallowed the bitter taste in his mouth, closing his eyes in apology to his pride as he called, “Nott, wait.” 

“Yes, Potter?” Nott asked with a twisted smile. The git was enjoying this. 

“Fix him.”

“Why, Potter, I was under the impression the Golden Boy was more polite.”

Harry gritted his teeth, tightening his hold on Ron — reminding himself that it was his best friend’s wellbeing on the line. It didn’t matter if Nott won. It didn’t matter how hurt Hermione might be that she didn’t know how to help. All that mattered was helping Ron get better — without being once more humiliated by Mrs. Weasley’s enraged Howler.  

“Fix him… please.”

“Since you asked so nicely.” Nott said, all too pleased with himself. 

The other boy came closer, peering down to take a closer look. Again, Harry felt hatred swelling inside him at how tall Nott was, how… composed. It was unfair. While Ron was hunched forward, stubbornly refusing to keep still so Nott could assess him properly, and Harry was struggling to support the weight of his friend, Nott had a certain grace to him. Not posh or aristocratic like Malfoy, but a messy type of grace as he brushed his raven hair away from his face. 

Nott pointed his wand to the middle of Ron’s face, smirking when the red-headed flinched. He purposefully mumbled the spell unintelligently, making sure none of them would be able to hear the counter-jinx. Harry could hear Hermione’s indignant wail to the side, but he breathed more easily as, after the faint purple light subsided, Ron’s face started returning to its original colour. 

“Look at that,” Nott commented almost to himself, “I owe Draco two galleons.”

“And why is that?” Hermione asked, her curiosity getting the better of her. 

“See, I thought it would be the mighty Potter coming to the rescue, not Weasel here.” 

“You mean that you planned this?!” Hermione shrieked. “You and Malfoy planned on getting a rise out of Ron all along?”

“We were going for the beaver that Boy-Wonder and his sidekick have for a best friend.” Nott commented, unconcerned before their anger. Anger directed at him. “But I guess we should’ve known you wouldn’t understand an insult if it slapped you in the face, Granger.”

“What was it that Malfoy called her?” Harry asked, ignoring the way Ron was attempting to pull him back, away from Nott, without uttering a sound. It was almost like Ron was afraid to open his mouth. 

“You don’t know what a Mudblood is? Merlin, that’s just priceless!” Nott leaned back against the tree as he glanced sideways at Hermione. “Mudbloods, Potter, are those lesser wizards and witches who have a full Muggle heritage. I personally like to call them a fluke — a joke of the universe, if you will.” 

“You’re wrong!” Hermione cried out, her voice wet as she trembled in place. 

“Am I? You don’t have any relative with a drop of magical blood, Granger. It’s a twisted coincidence that you have magic at all. You found out there is such a thing as a Wizarding World when you turned eleven. And now here you are — walking the hallways of Hogwarts parroting Muggle crap to whom wants to hear, having no idea what’s what. It’s because of clueless Mudbloods like you that Hogwarts has to base our education on level zero. Life would be easier if your kind didn’t exist at all.” 

“Blood means nothing, Nott.” Ron spat. “Only bigoted Purebloods like you think so.” 

“You say that because your family is just as pathetic as they are.” Nott shrugged. “Mudbloods should stay where they belong instead of intruding and delaying our world. They will never amount to much anyway.”

“What are you saying?” Hermione asked fearfully. 

“Think of that what you will, Granger.” With a wave of his wand, Nott’s sprawled parchments and his book packed themselves on his bag, which he slung over his shoulder. “If you three will excuse me, I have a bet to pay.”

“How’d Malfoy know to insult Hermione?” Harry inquired before Nott could walk away from them, wanting to know how the two Slytherins seemed to always be two steps ahead of them. Two steps ahead of everyone else. 

“It may come as a surprise to you, Potter, but neither of your friends is very well liked.” Nott deadpanned. “Granger especially. Draco knew she would have something to say about the brooms and we thought we would punch her off her little pedestal for a change.” 

“But she is right about the brooms.” Harry said, feeling dumb when Nott laughed openly at him. 

Of course, Hermione had been right about the brooms. Everyone could have guessed that, Harry realised, but only Hermione had made the mistake of pointing it out. Nott and Malfoy were Slytherins. They didn’t fight for the sake of defending themselves or to prove their righteousness. Like the snakes they were, they instigated fights to bring people down, to humiliate others. It didn’t matter how wrong they were, or how dirty they played. 

“I never said she isn’t, Potter.” Nott admitted, much to Harry’s surprise. “But don’t kid yourself, Golden Boy — Draco is not talentless like your little beaver insinuated.”

Nott left them standing alone among the trees, then. Ron was still struggling to stay upright on his own, Harry was seething, and Hermione was sniffling. 

It was frustrating — how Nott had needed but words to render them like that. How he had helped and destroyed them in less than five minutes of interaction.

“Let’s just… let’s go back to the Common Room.” Harry said defeated. 

“I’d rather swallow a thousand slugs than deal with that guy ever again.” Ron commented, eyeing the slugs sliding slowly on the grass below their feet as if they were the lesser of two evils. 

“Was it true? What Nott said?” Hermione asked quietly, her tone small. She had stopped walking as soon as they arrived at the doors of the castle as if she was reconsidering getting in — reconsidering her place there. 

“Of course not, ‘Mione!” Ron said vehemently. “Nott has no idea what he’s talking about — he and Malfoy both. Mudblood’s just a really foul name for someone who is Muggle-Born — you know, non-magical parents. Some wizards — like the Malfoys and the Notts — think they’re better than everyone else because they’re what people call Pureblood.” Ron gave a small burp, looking relieved when no slug spilt from his mouth. He then frowned, as if remembering that Nott was the reason for that. “I mean, the rest of us know it doesn’t make any difference at all. Look at Neville — he’s Pureblood and he can hardly stand a cauldron the right way up.”

“Come on, Ron, cut him some slack. Snape’s out for Neville’s blood. Of course, he won’t do well in potions.” Harry commented quietly, feeling it was his duty to defend their roommate. “And he’s pretty brilliant in Herbology, too.” 

“Whatever,” Ron waved him off, “point is — Nott is wrong. It’s a disgusting thing to call someone a Mudblood. Dirty Blood, see. Common blood. It’s bloody ridiculous. Most wizards these days are Half-Blood like Harry anyway. If wizards hadn’t married Muggles we’d’ve died out.”

“That doesn’t mean Nott’s not right, though, does it?” Hermione asked. “He said Muggle-Borns are but a fluke, that we are at fault for Hogwarts having to offer such primary education like the First Year Curriculum.” 

“Many Purebloods need to learn too, ‘Mione.” Ron tried lamely. 

“Yes, but even they know basics already. And I’ve read —” Hermione choked, “I’ve read that some wizards are more powerful than others. And that part of the reason for it is a genetic component. I don’t have any genetic component, no special ability like Nott or even Neville.”

“Nott was just trying to get into your head, Hermione. That’s what he and Malfoy do.” Harry squeezed her shoulder in reassurance. For as much as Hermione annoyed him at times, he hated seeing her so desolated like that, doubting herself because of half a sentence Nott had thrown at her. “Don’t let him get to you. There hasn’t been a single spell we’ve learned you couldn’t do.”

“Thank you, Harry.” Hermione smiled toothily at him, taking his hand in hers and pulling him inside the castle. 

Harry stole a glance behind him to find Ron scowling at the ground, mumbling “You’re welcome too, Hermione.” 

He was about to remediate yet another situation between his two friends when he heard his name being called, “There you two are, Potter, Weasley — Wood said you’d be at Hagrid’s.” Professor McGonagall stopped before she could reach the double doors, looking stern in her grey robes. “Do not forget your detentions this evening.”

“What are we going to be doing, Professor?” Ron asked, dread already twisting his features. 

“Are you alright, Weasley?” Their Professor frowned. “You look rather green in the face.” 

“Just… ate too much.” Ron shifted uncomfortably, sighing in relief when McGonagall dismissed her concerns. 

“You, Mr. Weasley, will be polishing the silver in the trophy room with Mr. Filch. And no magic is allowed, Mr. Weasley — elbow grease.”

Ron gulped and Harry was just glad he wouldn’t be having this detention with Ron. Argus Filch might not be a Snape, but he was a very close second in his like for nastiness and how much he hated every student — Harry in particular. 

“And you, Potter,” Harry snapped his attention back to the Transfiguration Professor, “will be helping Professor Lockhart once more — answering his fan mail.”

Harry’s relief vanished. 

“Oh no — Professor, can’t I go to the trophy room, too?” He tried desperately. 

“Certainly not. You and Mr. Weasley seemed extra ineffective when put together. No — and Professor Lockhart has requested you particularly. Eight o’clock sharp, both of you — not one minute later.”

Harry groaned as soon as McGonagall’s robes disappeared around the corner and he continued walking ahead when he noticed Hermione sheepish behind them, wearing a well-you-did-break-school-rules sort of expression.   

He wished he could just go back to bed before Oliver came to pick him up for training. 

His Saturday melted away in the same gloomy mood it had started. He had opted for staying put in the Common Room for the day, deciding that avoidance was the best remedy if he wanted to stay clear of any more interactions with Nott and Malfoy. 

Before he was ready, though, the clock above the fireplace showed he had five minutes to get to Lockhart’s classroom. He had prayed those five minutes would last a lifetime as he dragged himself through the castle, getting slower and slower the further he walked along the second-floor corridor. 

He debated how much trouble he would be in for fleeing, and decided he wouldn’t risk being given more detentions — not when he knew Nott was a champion and the chances of him having to serve his punishment with the Slytherin were higher the more frequent his detentions were. 

The door flew open as soon as Harry’s knuckles clapped the surface. He managed a painful smile as Lockhart beamed down at him, his blond hair shining impossibly bright even at night. 

Harry felt dizzy at how many white smiles were hanging from the walls, all portraits of Lockhart himself. He was his own decoration, his books the only ones filling the lone shelf near the window and his fan letters pilling up on both the tables at the front of the classroom. 

Boredom was more painful than the throbbing he felt on the junctures of his fingers as he signed one more letter. It was mind-numbing to hear Lockhart’s advice as if Harry could care less about being a celebrity. “Fame’s a fickle friend, Harry,”, “Celebrity is as celebrity does, remember that,”, “Fame should never come above essence”. Every few minutes Lockhart would repeat one of the mottos he had on the undercover of his books, and Harry would try to pretend to be listening to him. 

He was trying to measure time by the burning of the candles, urging them to burn lower and lower with his eyes. He took a break to move his aching hand over what felt like the thousandth envelope and stared miserably at the window. 

The moon was high in the sky and the chandelier above his head had only three of five alight fires, Lockhart having tried and failed to restore them to their original state. It must be nearly time to leave, he thought, please let it be nearly time to leave. 

And then he heard something — something quite apart from the spitting of dying candles and Lockhart’s prattled about his fans. It was a voice worth of his nightmares, a voice to chill the bone marrow, a voice of breathtaking, ice-cold venom. Evil. 

“Come… come to me… Let me rip you… Let me tear you… Let me kill you…”

Harry froze, the feather he was holding falling from his hands and smudging Veronica Smethley’s street name with a large lilac blot. His eyes widened in fear as he sneakily glanced to his sides, looking for a possible killer. 

“What?” He said loudly once the voice stopped, and he didn’t know where it was coming from anymore. 

“I know!” Lockhart exclaimed excitedly. “Six solid months at the top of the best-seller list! Broke all the records!”

“No,” Harry told his Professor frantically. “The voice!”

“Sorry?” Lockhart questioned confusedly, looking more puzzled than his usual. “What voice?”

“That — that voice that said — didn’t you hear it?”

Lockhart was looking at Harry in astonishment. 

“What are you talking about, Harry? Perhaps you’re getting a little drowsy? Great Scott — look at the time! We’ve been here nearly four hours! I’d never believed it — the time really flies when you have fun, doesn’t it?”

Harry didn’t answer. He was straining his ears to hear the voice again, but there was no sound now except for Lockhart telling him he mustn’t expect a treat like this every time he got detention. Still feeling dazed, Harry left, eyes still darting everywhere with each step he took. 

It was so late that the Gryffindor Common Room was almost completely empty. Harry went straight up to the dormitory. Ron wasn’t back yet, and Harry took the time to get into his pyjamas silently. He got into bed and waited. 

It was half an hour later when Ron strutted inside, nursing his right arm and bringing a strong smell of polish into the darkened room whose silence was only disturbed by Neville’s snores. 

“My muscles have all seized up.” His friend groaned, sinking into his bed without bothering to change his clothes. “Fourteen times he made me buff that Quidditch Cup before he was satisfied. And then I found a bunch of slugs inside the Special Award for Services to the School — Nott and Malfoy’s work, of bloody course.” Ron growled low in his throat, his anger still evident. “Still don’t know how the slimy gits found out where I’d be, though. It took me ages to get the slime off… How was it with Lockhart?”

Keeping his voice so as not to wake anyone — and not to clue anyone in on what happened — Harry told Ron exactly what he had heard. 

“And Lockhart said he couldn’t hear it?” Ron asked, turning on his side so now Harry knew to be speaking with his friend face to face. “D’you think he was lying? But I don’t get it — even someone invisible would’ve had to open the door, and there is no way you wouldn’t’ve heard it.”

“I know.” Harry mumbled, lying back down and staring at the canopy above him. “I don’t get it either.”

“You know what I think happened?” Harry hummed for Ron to continue, “I think that’s Nott’s idea of a prank. It makes sense, doesn’t it? I mean — he pranked me, why not prank you, too? This certainly seems like the type of sick thing he’d do.”

“I guess so.” Harry commented, seeing the logic in Ron’s statement. Nott clearly enjoyed making people squirm, and there was no better way to do that than to have Harry thinking an invisible murderer was rounding the school — a murderer only Harry could hear. “Yeah, it sounds like Nott.”

“Maybe you should talk to Hermione. See if she knows how Nott and Malfoy could’ve done it.” Ron suggested. 

“I don’t think that’s a good idea. Hermione has… a lot on her plate — the thing with Nott skipping a year and everything.” Harry said. “Besides, she would either insist on speaking with Lockhart or make us read every single book in the library looking for mentions of an invisible ghost or something.”

“Reckon you’re right.” Ron sighed. “I think Nott and Malfoy’ve really gotten to ‘Mione this year. I’m telling you, Harry, she will go complete bunkers.”

“I know, but I don’t really have any idea how to help her. It’s not like we can tape Nott’s mouth shut so he won’t gain House Points anymore.”

“Slytherin is in first place in the House Cup, did you see?” Ron remarked bitterly. “They passed Ravenclaw yesterday. Hanna Abbot from Hufflepuff told Dino and Simas that Malfoy, Nott and Zabini got almost sixty points in Charms. She reckons Nott jinxed half of her House, though. Pity he wasn’t caught.”

“Maybe if Snape hadn’t deducted so many points from us…”

“We still have the Quidditch Cup, though. I don’t believe for a second Malfoy knows the first thing about playing seeker.” 

“Winning the Cup would give us a lot of points, rights?”

“A few dozens, I reckon.” Ron mused. “‘Mione would certainly be happy if she could throw it on Nott’s face.”

“That would be good.”

“And if we win we don’t have to deal with Malfoy’s bragging.” 

Harry chuckled lowly, “True.”

Feeling better, he turned on his side, hearing Ron’s thundering snores not five minutes later.

Chapter Text

“I can’t believe you made me go through that, Harry.” Ron complained, still looking green in the face. “I might never eat again. What was that rotten smell, anyway? I never knew food could go that bad.” 

“Well — the ghosts seemed to like it.” Harry offered lamely. 

“I’m not even sure ghosts can eat.” Ron scrunched his nose in disgust. “That fish looked disgusting inside that poor sod’s stomach.” 

“I told you not to look.” 

“We lost the feast for that, I hope you know.” Ron said snappily. “There always is pudding on Halloween Feast — maybe it’s not finished yet. We should check it out.”

Harry rolled his eyes at his friend. He should have known Ron wouldn’t last a few minutes without eating. 

“Stop being childish, Ronald.” Hermione interrupted, coming in between Ron and Harry after having finally caught up with their longer strides as they rushed out of the dungeons towards the entrance hall. “A promise is a promise, and Harry promised Nearly Headless Nick he would come to celebrate his Death-day with him.”

“Why would someone want to celebrate the day they died anyway?” Ron mumbled. “It was dead boring. And why in hell would he invite Peeves? He is not even a ghost.”

“He is almost there, though.” Harry said, remembering the grinning Poltergeist that roamed the Hogwarts corridors. Snape usually referred to him as the ‘airborne menace who lived to cause havoc and distress’, and Harry couldn’t really help but agree. 

Peeves was one of the reasons why Harry had had to go to Nick’s party in the first place. 

October had arrived more slowly than Harry would have liked. This year seemed to be dragging itself into each passing hour. With the change in season, though, came the spreading of a damp chill over the grounds and into the castle. 

Harry had started wearing socks to sleep, his covers not enough to warm him at the top of Gryffindor Tower. 

He quite liked the Fall. He found it strangely relaxing to watch the leaves changing colours from bubbling green to the warm shades of autumn. He hated the rain, though. Hated the non-stop wind that rendered half of the student body down with a cold. Madam Pomfrey has been kept busy by the sudden spate of febrile and sneezing students and staff members. 

Harry would have appreciated the rain had he been able to stay inside and watch the raindrops the size of bullets thundering on the castle windows for days on end. The lake had rose, the flower beds near the Herbology greenhouses turned into muddy streams, and Hagrid’s enormous pumpkins swelled the size of garden sheds. Wood’s enthusiasm for regular training sessions remained unrelated, though. 

He still woke up the Gryffindor Quidditch Team at the break of dawn on weekends to train, worked them to exhaustion until the last minute before curfew on the weekdays and made up more boards which Harry couldn’t begin to understand. 

Oliver’s fear of the Slytherin Team was the reason why Harry had been to be found, late one stormy Saturday afternoon a few days before Halloween, returning to his dorm completely drenched and splattered with mud. 

He had cursed the day Fred and George had succeeded in spying the Slytherins training and had not spared any details as they briefed Wood on just how fast those new Nimbus Two Thousand and One could fly — they had said the snakes were no more than seven greenish blurs, shooting through the air faster than Bludgers. Oliver had wanted more reports on the strategy Flint was using, but the twins had been found by no other than Nott. 

Fred and George had spent a whole of two days double-sighted, not even Madam Pomfrey succeeding in solving their sight. At least McGonagall had raged at Nott rather publicly, glaring at him every time he dared interrupt her with his excuses. Harry didn’t think the Transfiguration Professor had appreciated very much when Nott said he was doing the twins a favour, seeing as they liked duos so much. 

Harry had stopped to chat with Nearly Headless Nick when Filch’s cat appeared beside him, warning him about her owner’s incoming arrival. The Hogwarts’ caretaker had been in a foul mood since he both got the flu and Nott engaged Peeves in a competition to see who could plaster brains in the ceiling faster in the dungeons. He had become extra mean to the students dirtying his hallways, and he had not spared Harry once he found the source of the mud messing the entrance corridor on the sole of Harry’s shoes. 

That had been the first time Harry has been to Filch’s office, and he wasn’t planning on ever repeating that experience. The place was packed to the brim with file cabinets with the name of students, the papers inside listing their ‘crimes’. Harry had arched an eyebrow as he saw a whole drawer destined for the Weasley twins — and another one with Nott’s name written in big, angry letters. 

Harry had felt claustrophobic inside, a chill going up his spine as he spotted the chains hanging from the wall behind the crooked, fragile-looking table that Filch had been filling the paperwork for Harry. He had never believed the rumours that Filch had once hung students from their ankles as punishment, but the chains were the proof he needed. And he had suddenly wished to be back in the Quidditch Field, blind by the rain blurring the lenses of his glasses and with his fingers completely numb from the cold. 

He had been grateful when Nick created a distraction just above Filch’s office which allowed Harry to run away before he could be given a detention. As a thank you, Harry had promised to attend Nick’s Death-day party with Ron and Hermione. 

Harry regretted it now. The freezing cold of the agglomeration of ghosts and the piercing, agonising sound of a thousand fingernails scraping a blackboard that had been the background music of the party still was imprinted in his mind. He was sure that was going to be the background music of his next nightmare, that was for sure. 

“Honestly, Harry, how can you be so clueless?” Hermione chastised him, and Harry rushed his footsteps even more so she would have to run to keep up with him and Ron. She was out of breath as she continued. “A ghost and a poltergeist are absolutely nothing alike. For starters —”

“No one cares, Hermione.” Ron thankfully interrupted her before she could start. “They’re all just a bunch of undying pains in the arse. Seriously, what’s the deal with that Myrtle? Must she moan every word that comes out of her mouth?”

“Well — I admit she can be quite… annoying, and I don’t use the girl’s toilet on the first floor not to run into her, but… well, she died very young. It’s understandable that she’d be so —”

“It’s not understandable at all.” Ron interrupted her again, and Harry nodded along with his friend. 

Moaning Myrtle’s dismayed face was another one that would hunt him at night. As would her shrieking voice. 

They were almost at the entrance of the Great Hall when Harry froze, Hermione bumping into him. 

He was hearing the voice again. The same cold, murderous, paralysing voice he had heard in Lockhart’s office. 

“…rip… tear… kill…” 

“Harry, what’re you —?” Ron started to ask, approaching the stonewall Harry had his ears pressed against. 

It was like the voice was coming from inside. As if it had just passed by them and was then moving away, vanishing just as suddenly as it had appeared. 

Harry looked around desperately, not finding any sight of Nott anywhere. 

“It’s that voice again — shut up for a minute —”

“… sooo hungry… for so long…”

“Listen!” Harry exclaimed urgently, sprinting ahead with Ron and Hermione on his heels. 

“Harry!” Ron called. “You’re still on that? It’s just Nott trying to scare you!”

“…kill… time to kill…”

“Can’t you hear it?!” Harry asked as Hermione continued to peer up at him as if he was crazy. 

“N-No, Harry.” She answered. 

“This can’t be Nott.” Harry concluded. “How would he even —” the voice continued to grow fainter, going… upwards. “This way!” He shouted. 

A mixture of fear and excitement gripped at Harry’s heart as he began to run up the stairs to the first floor, trying to drown off the rumbling voices coming from the Feast apparently still happening in the Great Hall. 

“Harry, what’re you doing?” Ron demanded, breathless. “Nott and Malfoy will just jump out of an alcove and take the mickey—”

“Hush, Ron!” Harry strained his ears. 

“… I smell blood… I SMELL BLOOD!” Distantly, he made out the sound still coming from above, and he couldn’t understand how this person remained invisible all this time. He should have seen at least a shadow in front of him on the stairs, the alighted torches would’ve made sure of it. 

His stomach lurched as he made sense of the meaning. 

“Oh, my — it’s going to kill someone!” He gasped, ignoring his friend’s disbelieving expressions as he followed the hisses to the second floor, running as fast as his legs would take him, trying desperately to hear the voice over the thundering noise of his own footsteps bagging against the hard stone ground. 

Harry was annoyed at Ron’s and Hermione’s painting behind him, calling his name breathlessly to stop, but he paid them no mind as he rounded the corner without losing speed. He had to come to an abrupt stop as they turned into the last, deserted passage. There was no corridor left for him to run. 

And there was no one else there besides him, Ron and Hermione. 

“Harry, what was that all about?” Ron hissed at him, wiping the newly formed beds of sweat off of his reddened face. “We couldn’t hear anything! And why the hell would Nott want to kill —”

He was interrupted by Hermione’s gasp, a trembling finger pointing down the corridor, “Look!” She exclaimed, terrified. 

As Harry stared at her, he found his friend whiter than a sheet of paper. 

Something was shining on the wall ahead. Harry approached it slowly, deaf to Hermione’s frantic whispers for him not to come any closer, and he narrowed his eyes to see amid the darkness. He stumbled backwards as he made out the foot-high words which had been daubed on the wall between two windows, shimmering in the light cast by the flaming torches nearby, and glistening wetly under the faint glow of the moon that illuminated that spot alone — and nowhere else. 

THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS HAS BEEN OPENED. 

ENEMIES OF THE HEIR, BEWARE. 

“What’s that thing —” Ron swallowed the lump in his throat, a quiver making his voice waver “hanging underneath?” 

Harry took a deep breath as he edged nearer, careful not to lose sight of his surroundings. His lack of focus cost him as he almost slipped into the large puddle of water he hadn’t noticed before. Ron and Hermione thankfully grabbed him before he could fall face first and, together, they inched closer to the message, eyes fixed on the bundle of shadows left unmoving beneath it. 

The water under their feet splashed as they all leapt backwards simultaneously, the realisation of exactly what was that bundle of shadows, and what was the metallic smell filling their nostrils and downing on them at once. 

For a few seconds, none of them uttered a word. None of them moved a muscle, too frightened to even emit a sound. 

Then Ron shakily said, “Let’s get out of here. Now.”

“Maybe — S-Shouldn’t we try to help —?” Harry began awkwardly. 

Ron shook his head, “Trust me,” he said after gulping, “we do not want to be found here.”

Harry was about to agree when a rumble, as though a distant thunder, told them that the feast had just ended. Harry groaned, realising that there was no way for them to run without bumping into a sea of students returning to their Common Rooms, nowhere for them to hide in the deserted, empty corridor. 

From either side of the hallway where they stood came the sound of hundreds of feet climbing the stairs, and the loud, happy talk of well-fed people. The next moment, students were crashing into the passage from both ends. And the chatter, the bustle, all the noise died suddenly as the people in front spotted the hanging cat and stopped walking. 

Complaints were heard after the crashing of bodies, but even those died down as every single pair of eyes locked on the scene in front of them — on the forms of Harry, Ron and Hermione standing alone, clothes wet, in the middle of the corridor. 

“Of course, it’s the Golden Boy —” An annoyed voice drawled in the distance, and Harry closed his eyes tightly as Nott and Malfoy pushed their way to the front of the group, a small, frightened-looking girl hiding behind them and alerting Malfoy to the fact that something was obviously wrong. 

“A tad bit dramatic, don’t you think, Draco? Enemies of the heir, beware.” Nott read out loud, his eyebrow arching in boredom as he stole a quick glance at the girl and, to Harry’s surprise, said nothing as he continued standing in front of her. 

Malfoy, though, smirked directly at the trio, “You’ll be next, Mudbloods!”

“What’s going on here? What’s going on?” Attracted no doubt by the agglomeration of students on his pristine hallways, Filch came shouldering his way through the crowd, his angry grimace cracking as he saw his cat’s prone form on the floor. 

Harry cluelessly searched his friends with his eyes, finding the two of them looking as awkward as him as Filch fell back, clutching his face in horror. 

“My cat! My cat! What’s happened to Mrs. Norris!” He shrieked, his popping, wet eyes falling on Harry. “You!” Filch yelled. “You! You’ve murdered my cat! You’ve killed her! I’ll kill you! I’ll —”

Harry felt his eyes widening comically, his voice failing him as he tried to deny it. 

“Argus!”

Harry staggered in relief as Headmaster Dumbledore arrived on the scene, followed by several other teachers. In seconds, he had swept past Harry, Ron and Hermione — not sparing any of them a glance — and detached Mrs. Norris from the torch bracket. 

“Calm down, Argus.” Dumbledore said gravely. “Mrs. Norris is not dead.”

“Something happened to her!” Filch continued to scream, hysterical. “My poor, poor cat — Potter attacked my cat! I demand to see some punishment!”

“This isn’t Mr. Potter’s work, Argus.”

“Of course it is!” Hermione gasped as spit came out of Filch’s mouth when he yelled at the headmaster. “You see what he wrote on the wall!”

“Ha! Potter?!” Nott snorted loudly. “Has anyone ever seen his scrawls? Blood dripping apart, this message is far too neatly written to have been Potter.” Harry glared at him as a few students giggled nervously, not knowing if they should allow themselves to be amused when they had a threat hanging over their heads. “Besides,” Nott continued with a smirk, “I doubt Potter would spell all the words correctly.”

“That’s quite enough, Mr. Nott.” Professor McGonagall reprimanded the Slytherin, slapping him half-heartedly on the back of his head as Nott dared blow her a kiss. “Honestly, it’s like dealing with your mother all over again.”

“Thanks.” Nott said cheekily, bumping fists with a grinning Malfoy. 

“Come with me, Argus,” Dumbledore commanded, as if the previous interaction had not happened at all, “you, too, Mr. Potter, Mr. Weasley and Miss Granger. The rest of you, follow your prefects back to your Common Rooms.”

Harry noticed that no one moved immediately. All the stares were still focused on the scene ahead. It wasn’t until Percy stepped forward and ordered the Gryffindors to follow him that all the prefects followed suit. The last to move were Nott and Malfoy, who continued staring blankly at the wall, only coming back to reality when the girl who had been using them as a shield tapped Nott on the shoulder, nodding in the direction of the dungeons, all the Slytherins were disappearing into. 

Harry was still feeling dazed as Lockhart offered his office eagerly, stuffing his chest importantly as Dumbledore thanked him for his promptness and led the way to the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom, Harry, Ron, Hermione, Lockhart, McGonagall and Snape following closely behind him. 

Harry sat in the front of Lockhart’s classroom as Hermione did, glad that Lockhart seemed to still not have figured out how to make his candles last longer. The room was barely lit, very few and spread between flames illuminating mainly the amble space closest to Lockhart’s portraits, which had all rushed into hiding so none of the newcomers would notice the rollers on their hair. 

Dumbledore laid the cat on the desk at the front and started examining her with the tip of his wand, his long, crooked nose inches away from Mrs. Norris’ crumpled fur. Professor McGonagall was bent almost as close, her eyes narrowed and forehead with a frown of concentration. Snape loomed behind them, morphing into the shadows, and wearing an expression which ignited hatred inside Harry — it was as though the potions professor was trying very hard not to smile, sometimes rolling his eyes in Lockhart’s general direction as the jumpy blond hovered around the other three, making what Harry reckoned were useless suggestions. 

“It was definitely a curse that killed her — probably the Transmogrifian Torture — I’ve seen it used many times, so unlucky I wasn’t there, I know the very counter curse that would have saved her…”

Lockhart’s comments were punctuated by Filch’s dry, racking sobs. Harry felt a pang of sadness at the loathsome man, then, as he noticed Filch slumped in a chair behind the desk, unable to even look at his beloved cat, his face buried in his hands. 

Harry couldn’t help feeling sorry, but his empathy faded little by little as he wondered that, if Filch was to be believed by the Headmaster, then Harry would take the blame, and that would surely render him expelled, back at his relative’s mercy. 

Ron covered his snort with a cough as McGonagall glared at Lockhart, murmuring under her breath, “Strange you’ve seen it in use, considering such a curse is but a made-up story for children.”

“… I remember something very similar happening in Ouagadougou,” Lockhart continued, not having heard, “a series of attacks, the full story’s in my autobiography, I was able to provide the townsfolk with various amulets, which cleared the matter up at once…”

Dumbledore seemed to be ignoring the not-so-skilled professor, Hagrid had told Harry that the headmaster had had no other option but to hire. He was now muttering strange words under his breath and tapping Mrs. Norris with his wand but nothing happened. The cat continued to look as though she had been recently stuffed. 

Harry was getting anxious as all the headmaster did had no effect whatsoever. His hands were twisting in his lap as Dumbledore finally straightened up, his face sulking.

“She’s not dead, Argus.” He repeated softly. 

“Not dead?” Filch choked, looking up through his fingers. “Then why’s she all — all stiff and frozen?”

“I’m afraid she’s been petrified. But how, I still cannot say…”

“Ask him!” Filch shrieked once more, pointing a tear-stained finger at Harry, who had no reaction but to shake his head furiously and pray that the headmaster would see the desperate truth in his expression. 

“No second-year could have done this, Argus.” Dumbledore declared firmly, and Harry noticing the relief on Ron’s face mirroring his own, his best friend immediately sending him an encouraging smile. “It would require knowledge of the most advanced of the Dark Arts —”

“He did it, he did it!” Filch continued to spat hysterically, completely unreasonable as he looked for someone to blame. “You saw what he wrote in the wall —!”

“I remember Mr. Nott cleverly ruling that option out, Argus.” Snape commented absently, a smirk contorting his features. Harry glared at him. 

“He found — in my office when I went after Peeves — he knows I’m a —” Filched stuttered, his eyes crazed, and Harry thought he was talking about the purple envelope Harry had read upon being left alone in Filch’s office earlier that week. He hoped someone noticed how genuinely lost he was. He had understood nothing which was written in that latter. “I’m a — He knows I’m a Squib!” He finished. 

“I’ve never touched Mrs. Norris!” Harry spoke loudly, uncomfortably aware of everyone looking at him — of the disapproving edge he found in McGonagall's strict stare. “And I have no idea what a Squib is.”

“Oh, Harry, how embarrassing, a Squib is —”

“Rubbish!” Filch interrupted Hermione. “He saw my Kwikspell letter!”   

“If I may, Headmaster,” Snape spoke from the shadows, and the dread growing inside Harry became a massive weight on his stomach. Snape was certainly going to screw him over. “Potter and his… friends may have simply been in the wrong place at the wrong time. As Mr. Nott pointed out so eloquently, the chances of Potter being skilled enough to pull such a stunt are minimal.” A sneer twisted Snape’s expression, and Harry knew that the Potions Professor has never had any intention of coming to his defence. “But we do have a set of suspicious circumstances here. Why was he in the upstairs corridor at all? Why wasn’t he — and both of his friends — at the Halloween feast?”

Harry instantly launched into an explanation about his previous encounter with Nearly Headless Nick and his promise to attend his Death-day part, “… there were hundreds of ghosts, they’ll tell you we’re there all the time.”

“But why not join the feast afterwards?” Snape asked, black eyes glittering. “Why go up that corridor at all?”

“Because — because —” Harry could think of no excuse, but he couldn’t tell the teachers he had been following a bodiless voice, such a voice that only he could hear and who had been delighted at the smell of fresh blood and the prospect of killing. He couldn’t tell them he has heard such a voice weeks before but had done absolutely nothing because he had been sure it had been Nott messing with him, and he didn’t want to lose to the Slytherin yet again. “Because we were tired and wanted to go to bed.” He finished lamely. 

“Without any supper?” Snape inquired, not even bothering to hide how triumphant he was feeling. “I doubt very much the food provided by your friend — Nick — would be edible for the living.”

“We weren’t hungry.” Ron came to his defence, but Harry felt the urge to facepalm as his friend’s stomach rumbled loudly. 

Snape smiled nastily at them. 

“I suggest, headmaster, that Potter is not being entirely truthful. It might be a good idea if he were deprived of certain privileges until he is ready to tell us the whole story. I personally feel he should be taken off the Gryffindor Quidditch team until he is ready, to be honest.”

“Really, Severus,” Professor McGonagall immediately said, her tone sharp, “I see no reason to stop the boy from playing Quidditch. This cat wasn’t hit over the head with a broomstick. There is no evidence at all that Potter has done anything wrong, and it would be simply unfair to extend such unfounded punishment to my House Team.”

Ron snickered as Harry slumped back in his chair. 

If anyone had threatened Quidditch before, McGonagall would have come to defend him much earlier. 

“Innocent until proven guilty, Severus.” Dumbledore declared. 

“My cat has been petrified!” Filch screamed furiously. “Someone must be punished!”

“We will be able to cure her, Argus.” Dumbledore said patiently. “Professor Sprout recently managed to produce some Mandrakes. As soon as they have reached their full size, I will have a potion made that will revive Mrs. Norris.”

“I can brew it!” Lockhart butted in. “I must have done it a thousand times. I could whip up a Mandrake Restorative Draught in my sleep —”

“Excuse me,” Snape interrupted icily, “but I believe I am the Potions master at this school.”

Harry’s hands resumed twisting as the awkward pause extended, Snape simply staring Lockhart down as the other wizard squirmed in place. 

“You may go now.” Dumbledore thankfully said to Harry, Ron and Hermione, who bolted from the classroom barely a second after. 

They went away as quickly as their legs would take them without actually running, lest they disturb any of the sleeping portraits and started yet another commotion. They were almost at their Common Room when Harry stopped walking, questions still bombarding his head, and the prospect of others hearing any of them not sitting well with him. 

“Do you think I should’ve told them about the voice I heard?” He asked his friends. 

“No.” Ron responded without missing a beat. “Hearing voices no one else can hear isn’t a good thing, Harry — not even in the Wizarding World.”

Harry frowned slightly at the note of scepticism he found in Ron’s tone, not liking that his best friend didn’t look him in the eye as he answered. 

“You — you do believe me, don’t you, Ron?”

“Course I do!” Ron said quickly. Too quickly almost. “But — you gotta admit, Harry, — it’s kinda weird…”

“I know.” Harry conceded. “Hermione?” He asked, finding the girl had remained weirdly quiet since now. 

“I — I don’t know, Harry.” She said uncertainly. “I believe you — I do! But I think maybe you should have said something. Perhaps not to Snape or… or even Lockhart, as I know you can’t comprehend how brilliant he is, ” Harry rolled his eyes at her, “but Headmaster Dumbledore might have had an idea what to do.”

“Or he would find it even weirder and Harry would’ve gotten expelled.” Ron hissed, his thoughts mimicking Harry’s. “Besides — we still don’t know what that voice is. It could’ve been a prank, for all we know!”

“The whole thing is just… extremely unusual.” Hermione said with a sight. “I don’t understand what that writing on the wall was about. The chamber has been opened… — what chamber? What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You know, it rings a sort of bell, but I can’t remember.” Ron rubbed his head, shrugging in defeat. Harry felt himself grow more frustrated. “I think someone told me a story about a secret chamber at Hogwarts once… might’ve been Bill… or Charlie… certainly not Percy, though…”

“Anyway.” Harry snapped, annoyed. “We won’t find out tonight.”

“Harry’s right. We should all just try to have a good night's sleep.” Hermione said and led the way towards their Common Room once more. 

It was then that Harry remembered the purple envelope he had read, and Filch’s extreme reaction to him reading its content…

“Hey, what’s a Squib?” He asked, arching an eyebrow as Hermione fixed Ron with an angry glare when their friend stifled a snigger. 

“Well — it’s not funny really — but as it’s Filch —” 

“Ronald!” Hermione snapped loudly, being shushed by the portrait of an old man. “Must you be always so tactless? Honestly. A Squib is someone who was born into a Wizarding family but hasn’t got any magical powers, Harry. Kind of the opposite of Muggle-Born wizards, but Squibs are even more unusual. I’ve been researching after our last encounter with Nott, and I’ve found out that there are many pieces of research around the subject — unfortunately, none of which can offer a concrete answer. Actually —”

“If Filch’s trying to learn magic from a Kwikspell course,” Ron interrupted Hermione before she could go into yet another rant about what she has been studying — how she was out to outshine Nott, “I reckon he must really be a Squib. It would explain a lot. Like why he hates students so much.” Ron gave a satisfied smile as they stopped at the entrance of Gryffindor Tower. “He’s bitter.”

Harry nodded in agreement as Hermione said the password and vanished inside, never wishing them a good night. 

Harry simply shrugged as Ron did. 

They were already laying on their beds, curtains were drawn close and hearing Neville’s loud breathing and Simas’ sneezes — the poor sod still fighting off his cold — when Harry whispered Ron’s name softly in the dark room. 

“You don’t think Nott and Malfoy had anything to do with it, do you?” He asked. 

“No.” Ron said after a few moments of consideration. “You heard Dumbledore, Harry. No second-year could have been able to petrify Mrs. Norris. Not even Nott.”

“Maybe.” Harry relented. “I just… Nott and Malfoy didn’t seem scared at all. Everybody was terrified, but not them. They seemed almost… curious.”

“Well — them not doing anything to that bloody cat doesn’t mean they didn’t know about it. Or that they didn’t help.”

“Maybe.” Harry said, not knowing what to think. 

Sleep didn’t come easy to him that night. 

Harry had considered never leaving his dormitory for the few days that followed what he preferred to refer to as the 'Mrs. Norris’ tragic incident'. 

There was barely any other talk in school apart from speculations of what happened. Few pretended to remain unaffected, but Harry could see everyone glancing uneasily around themselves, jumping in place at loud noises and staring suspiciously at anything out of the ordinary — some people seemed to think Harry was one of those things. 

He had noticed some students dodging him in the corridors, strutting faster as he came nearer, but he had tricked himself into thinking nothing of it. The mood in the castle was grey, as heavy as the incessant October rain. The sneaky, mysterious air brought by Halloween never dissipated, even if the decorating skulls and spider nets had been taken down by the time the morning after rolled around. 

The day before, however, Harry had tried to greet a fellow Hufflepuff, Justin Finch-Fletchley, when the boy went pale, stopped abruptly and stormed off in the opposite direction Harry was going. 

There was no hiding it anymore. As much as Dumbledore had proclaimed Harry innocent until proven guilty, he was still the prime suspect. And it sucked. He had never felt so many eyes on him before, following his every movement, analysing his every action. Waiting for him to write another message in blood on the wall. 

And Filch was not helping matters either. The Hogwarts’ janitor had gone complete bunkers — Ron’s words. He slacked off from his duties in order to surveil the corridor where his cat was found petrified as if he thought the guilty party would come back to finish the job. Harry had stayed clear of the area, hearing from others how Filch had lost all his control when he had been unable to clean the writing on the wall, throwing his full bucket at it and screaming in frustration. 

Rumour had it that he was now distributing detentions for the smallest of things — like looking too happy in his times of complete dismay. 

Ron’s younger sister seemed to be very disturbed by the fate of the crumpled cat, though, as Harry had never felt more uncomfortable in his life than when she came to sit next to Ron while they were by the fireplace in the Common Room and proceeded to burst into tears as she hyperventilated over the thought of Mrs. Norris never going back to normal. 

Harry had walked away quietly, then, finding Hermione furiously discussing with another first-year who was clutching a worn-out book to his chest. 

Apparently, the Chamber of Secrets was mentioned in Hogwarts: a Story and all the copies had vanished from the shelves of the library, having been borrowed by dozens of curious students. Hermione, who had forgotten her own copy at home, has been snappy since Mrs. Norris’ tragic incident because she couldn’t get her hands on another exemplary of the book. It was a shame that the first-year boy had been too terrified of her scowl to share it with her. 

She was still scowling, two days later, as, together with Ron, they made their way to the History of Magic classroom, where Professor Binns was already stationed at the front of the room, an old, dusty book open in front of him. He never waited for his students to sit down before he started reading from the dull pages. 

History of Magic was the perfect subject to nap the hours Harry couldn’t seem to fall asleep at night. Their Professor was a ghost, whose voice never wavered from that one, sleep-inducing timbre. The most exciting thing that had ever happened in his classes was his entering the room through the blackboard. Even if all the ghosts had the same translucent shape, coloured in that same pastry shade of ugly white, Professor Binns still appeared to be more ancient and shrivelled than the others, not aware that he was even dead. 

The day’s class was as boring as ever, and Harry sincerely couldn’t tell what was it the Professor was saying. His ears heard the noise of the ghost’s voice, and his eyes saw the mouth moving, but Harry’s brain couldn’t make up any words. There was a fog clouding his head, as he was sure was the case for all his peers. 

Ron had an actual droll coming out of his mouth. 

Professor Binns has been speaking nonstop for what Harry believed had been only half an hour already when a sudden movement made him stop. Harry had to blink twice in order to make sure his drunk brain wasn’t playing tricks on him. Hermione had her hand up, something which had never happened in a History of Magic lesson. 

 Even Binns seemed surprised at that as if he wasn’t sure what to do with a student who wanted to speak. 

“Miss — er —?” He called. 

“Granger, Professor. I was wondering if you could tell us anything about the Chamber of Secrets.” Hermione said, her voice ringing too shrill, far too loud, in the usual dully silent room. 

Professor Binns just blinked for a few seconds, taking in the reactions of his previously sleeping students. All of them were focused now, red eyes wide as they waited anxiously for Hermione’s question to be answered. Harry included. 

“My subject is History of Magic,” Binns said resolutely in his dry, wheezy voice, “I deal with facts, Miss Grant, not myths and legends.” He cleared his throat noisily, and Harry was half-sure he had mistaken Hermione’s name on propose. “In September of that year, a subcommittee of Sardinian sorcerers —”

He came to another annoyed halt mid-lecture as Hermione’s hand again waved in the air. 

“Yes, Miss Grant?”

“Please, sir,” Hermione gritted through clenched teeth, “don’t legends always have a basis in fact?”

Professor Binns stopped, his head bending to the side, “Well,” he said slowly, “yes, one could argue that, I suppose. However, the legend of which you speak is such a very sensational, even ludicrous tale —”

Professor Binns’ protest died down as he realised that the whole class was now hanging on his every word — a first in his classroom, Harry was sure. He looked dimly at them all, every face turned to his. Harry could see how thrown out the ghost was by the explicit display of interest. 

“Oh, very well. Let me see… the Chamber of Secrets. You all know, of course, that Hogwarts was founded over a thousand years ago — the precise date remains uncertain — by the four greatest witches and wizards of the age. The four school Houses are named after them: Godric Gryffindor, Helga Hufflepuff, Rowena Ravenclaw, and Salazar Slytherin. They built this castle together, far from prying Muggle eyes, for it was an age when magic was feared by common people, and witches and wizards suffered much persecution.”

He paused, gazed around the room, and continued. 

“For a few years, the founders worked in harmony together, seeking out youngsters who showed signs of magic and bringing them to the castle to be educated. But then disagreements spanned up among them. A rift began to grow between Slytherin and the others. Slytherin wished to be more selective about the students admitted to Hogwarts. He believed that magical learning should be kept within all-magic families. He disliked taking students of Muggle parentage, believing them to be untrustworthy. After a while, there was a serious argument on the subject between Slytherin and Gryffindor, and Slytherin left the school.”

Professor Binns paused again, pursing his lips, looking like a wrinkled old tortoise, “Reliable historical sources tell us this much. But these honest facts have been obscured by the fanciful legend of the Chamber of Secrets. The story goes that Slytherin had built a hidden chamber in the castle, of which the other founders knew nothing. Slytherin, according to the legend, sealed the Chamber of Secrets so that none would be able to open it until his own true heir arrived at the school. The heir alone would be able to unseal the Chamber of Secrets, unleash the horror within, and use it to purge the school of all who were unworthy to study magic.”

Only silence followed after Professor Binns stopped speaking. 

Harry felt a heavy weight settling on the pit of his stomach, dragging him down and spurring own his apprehension. What the professor was saying… made too much sense to be brushed off as a legend. The message on the wall and the petrified cat, whose owner was a Squib, fit too perfectly into the story as if filling in the steps for a disaster. 

There was an unease in the air as everyone fidgeted in place, all eyes still turned to the front, hoping for more — perhaps a consolation that the heir died without leaving any descendants behind. 

“The whole thing is arrant nonsense, of course.” Binns said. “Naturally, the school has been searched for evidence of such a chamber, many times, by the most learned witches and wizards. It does not exist. A tale told to frighten the gullible.”

Harry was very gullible, indeed, then. 

Hermione’s hand shot back into the air, startling Harry, “Sir — what exactly do you mean by the ‘horror within’ the Chamber?”

“That is believed to be some sort of monster, which the Heir of Slytherin alone can control.” The Professor explained, almost reluctant, a scowl on his face. He seemed more annoyed when the class exchanged nervous looks. “I tell you, the thing does not exist.” He proclaimed. “There is no Chamber and no monster.”

“But, sir,” began Seamus Finnigan, “if the Chamber can only be opened by the Slytherin’s true heir, no one else would be able to find it, would they?”

“Nonsense, Funnagin!” responded Professor Binns. “If a long succession of Hogwarts headmasters and headmistresses haven’t found the thing —”

“But, professor,” piped Parvati Patil, “you’d probably have to use Dark Magic to open it —”

“Just because a wizard doesn’t use Dark Magic doesn’t mean he can’t, Miss Peniscule!” Professor Binns snapped. “I repeat, if the likes of Dumbledore —”

“But maybe you’ve got to be related to Slytherin, so Dumbledore couldn’t —” Dean Thomas tried to push for more, but Harry could see the ghost had had enough before he waved Dino shut. 

“That will do!” He said sharply. “It is a myth! It does not exist! There is not a shred of evidence that Salazar Slytherin ever built so much as a secret broom cupboard! I regret telling you such a foolish story! We will return, if you please, to history, to solid, believable, verifiable fact!”

Not five minutes, the class fell back into its usual stupor. All, except for Harry. 

He was trying to imagine what kind of beast Slytherin would have chosen to secure his castle, and what kind of person would carry his legacy. What type of lunatic would agree still with Slytherin’s deranged ideas. 

Such thoughts were still rounding his mind when Harry followed Ron and Hermione outside of the classroom. 

“I always knew Salazar Slytherin was a twisted old loony.” Ron told Harry and Hermione as they fought their way through the teeming corridors. “But I never knew he started all this Pureblood supremacy stuff. I wouldn’t be in his house if you paid me. Honestly, if the Sorting Hat had tried to put me in Slytherin, I’d’ve got the train straight back home…”

Hermione nodded fervently, but Harry didn’t say anything. His stomach had just dropped. 

He had never felt comfortable telling either of his friends that Gryffindor hadn’t been the first option for him. He could remember as though it had happened yesterday how the hat had whispered not in his ears, but inside his mind how great Slytherin would enable him to be. He remembered the paralysing fear he felt upon making sense of those words — and what they entailed. 

Harry had begged the hat not to put him in Slytherin, and it had thankfully listened to his pleas. When the hat screamed Gryffindor, the Great Hall had erupted in loud applause, cheers coming from the lion’s table and even Headmaster Dumbledore seemed enthusiastic as he clapped. Harry doubted those would have been the reactions had the hat put him in Slytherin. 

Since his first day in the Wizarding World, when Hagrid took him to shop in Diagon Alley, Harry had been told of Slytherin’s reputation. Hagrid had been the first one to tell him that all Dark Wizards had but one thing in common apart from their twisted pleasures — they had all been part of the House of the snakes. And, upon meeting Ron on the train, his friend had said the same thing. 

Harry had walked through the entrance hall’s doors convinced that Slytherin was the only House he absolutely could not end up in. His resolution had only strengthened as he met Malfoy — and instantly disliked the blond for the way he treated Harry’s first and only friend. When the hat had taken mere seconds to put Malfoy in Slytherin, Harry’s hatred for the House had been solidified. 

He was now afraid he would be deserted if anyone ever found out the truth he has kept hidden for more than a year. 

The crowd thinned the closer they came to the staircase leading upstairs, and Harry was thankful for not having so many eyes staring daggers at his back, probably thinking he was the heir. 

“Do you really think there’s a Chamber of Secrets?” Ron asked Hermione in a whisper, even though they were now the only ones in the corridor. 

Hermione stopped in front of a glass window, this one overlooking the Hogwarts grounds near the Black Lake. She seemed pensive as she took her lower lip between her protuberant teeth, head tilting to the side and she focused on something Harry didn’t bother to check. 

“I don’t know.” She said, frowning. “Dumbledore couldn’t cure Mrs. Norris, and that makes me think that whatever attacked her might indeed not be human.” 

“I’ve been thinking about that, too.” Harry commented, coming to stand next to her. “Mostly about the heir, though. I think it might be possible that they are here in Hogwarts.”

“I guess we’d’ve caught wind of someone whose surname is blimey Slytherin, Harry.” Ron said, and Hermione scoffed. 

“Don’t be stupid, Ronald.” She snapped. “Names get lost as generations pass. It’s entirely plausible the heir has been roaming among us under a different name. And I think it’s Nott.”

Harry snapped his head in her direction, finding her pointing out of the window. Following the line of her finger, Harry found two dots in the distance, walking on the edge of the lake unbothered by the disgusting mud under their feet and the chilly weather of November. One of the dots had pitch black hair, while the other was so blond it shone brighter than the sun. 

Harry couldn’t fathom what Nott and Malfoy would be doing outside so close to dinner time, nor why the lake seemed to be of interest to them. 

“Come on, Hermione!” Ron exclaimed, arching a disbelieving eyebrow as he chuckled at Hermione. “Nott? Seriously? I bet this Chamber is not even real! And even if it is, why would Nott want to petrify a bloody cat?”

“It makes sense to be him.” Hermione insisted, her voice breaking no room for argument. “Think about it! Nott has expressed explicitly his disdain towards Muggle-Borns. He has said it with all the words that they — we — shouldn’t be welcomed in the Wizarding World at all. That’s Salazar Slytherin’s exact mentality!”

“Still, ‘Mione —” Ron tried, but Hermione held a hand up to him. 

“I also don’t believe it to be a coincidence that the Chamber has been opened in the year he arrived at the school. And he was sorted into Slytherin no less — after less than a second, I might add. Even Dumbledore seemed astonished at that during the Sorting Ceremony.” Hermione smiled victoriously as Ron opened his mouth in protest, but then closed it again. “And then there is his mother.”

“What about Nott’s mother?” Harry asked immediately. 

“I’ve been asking around — mostly to Pureblooded students, of course — and literally everyone refuses to talk about her past. They either don’t know or are not allowed to talk about her, but they all agree on the same thing: every single student I asked told me that Nott’s mother is evil. A sixth-year Ravenclaw even referred to her as a Dark Witch.” Hermione said proudly. “For all we know, she can be Slytherin’s descendant and the crime Mrs. Weasley claimed she committed during the war has to do with the Chamber. And now, her son is following her footsteps.”

Harry nodded along with what she was saying, seeing her logic. And almost being convinced by it. 

“I still think it can be Malfoy.” He said what he has been thinking since he assimilated that it had been Malfoy who had threatened the Muggle-Borns by name. 

“Malfoy?” Hermione asked, pouting to have Harry against her. “Why?”

“Malfoy seems to hate Muggle-Borns more than Nott does.” Harry explains. “And Dumbledore said the heir must have used Dark Magic to petrify Mrs. Norris. When I was stuck at Borgin & Burkes I caught Malfoy’s father selling dark artefacts, and Mr. Borgin was sure Mr. Malfoy was still hiding a lot in his house. Malfoy would’ve had access easily, which I don’t think Nott would.”

“Why not?” Ron asked. “His dad was a You-Know-Who follower.”

“Because Mr. Borgin told Mr. Malfoy that Mr. Nott sold all his dark stuff on the week Nott was born.”

Ron’s light blue eyes widened, as disbelieving as Harry had been when realisation dawned on him. 

“Well — maybe Harry’s right.” Hermione offered, her arms crossed tightly over her chest. Harry rolled his eyes at her behaviour. “But I don’t think we should just forget about Nott.” 

“It’s not like we can go down there and ask them.” Ron mumbled. 

“There might be another way.” Hermione said slowly, her voice dropping further than a whisper as she glanced at her sides, then out of the window, as if somehow Nott and Malfoy could hear her from the grounds. “Of course, it would be difficult. And dangerous, very dangerous. We’d be breaking about fifty school rules, I expect —”

“If in a month or so, you feel like explaining, you will let us know, won’t you?” Ron said irritably, sarcasm dripping from his tone. 

Hermione looked at him coldly, “What we’d need to do is to get inside the Slytherin Common Room and ask Malfoy and Nott a few questions without them realising it’s us.”

“But that’s impossible.” Harry said as Ron laughed loudly. 

“No, it’s not.” Hermione said annoyed. “All we’d need would be some Polyjuice Potion.”

“What’s that?” Harry and Ron asked at the same time. 

“Honestly, you two! You must start paying attention to classes — Professor Snape mentioned it a few weeks ago. It transforms you into somebody else. Think about it! We could change into three of the Slytherins. No one would know it was us. Malfoy and Nott would never expect it, so they would tell us anything. Knowing them, they are probably boasting about it right now, if only we could hear them.”

“I don’t know, Hermione.” Ron started. “This Polypotion stuff sounds a bit dodgy to me. What if we were stuck looking like three of the Slytherins forever?”

“Polyjuice Potion, Ronald. At least pretend to listen to me when I talk!” Hermione snapped impatiently. “And it wears off after a while. But getting a hold of the recipe will be very difficult. Professor Snape mentioned it was in a book called Moste Potente Potions and it’s bound to be in the Restricted Section of the library.”

Harry groaned. There were only two ways to get a book from the Restricted Section: you either had a note from a teacher getting you permission; or risked expulsion or a life-worth of detention by sneaking up in there. 

Harry was excited to neither. 

“Well —” Ron started, grinning at Harry, “we do have a very thick teacher this year, with a knack for celebrities.”

Harry groaned louder. 

Chapter Text

Previous Chapter

Hermione looked at him coldly, “What we’d need to do is to get inside the Slytherin Common Room and ask Malfoy and Nott a few questions without them realising it’s us.”

“I can’t believe we did it!” Harry exclaimed, chuckling under his breath as they entered the library. “He didn’t even look at the book we wanted.”

“That’s because he’s a brainless moron.” Ron said. “But who cares, we’ve got what we needed —”

“He’s not a brainless moron!” Hermione said shrilly, ducking her head in shame as Madam Pince, the librarian, shushed her with a disapproving glare, motioning for them to wait for her as she put a stack of books back in their shelves. 

“Come on, Hermione.” Ron whispered, rolling his eyes at their friend. “He’s dumber than a troll. I doubt he’s done half the things he wrote on his books.”

“Of course he’s done them! And I would have you know, Ronald, Professor Lockhart is an incredibly talented wizard. Headmaster Dumbledore wouldn’t have hired him otherwise.”

“Please.” Ron moaned. “You’re only saying that because he said you’re the best student of the year.”

Hermione blushed bright red, “Well — it’s a honour to be recognised by him —”

“Don’t be daft, Hermione.” Ron snapped, and Harry facepalmed as his friends continued to bicker. As Ron continued to not take notice of the dishevelled state he was rendering Hermione. “He only said that because he knows Nott jinxed all the pages of his books blank yesterday — he is just too stupid to prove it.”

“What’re you saying, Ronald?” Hermione gaped. “You think Nott is better?”

“I —” Ron stuttered, looking at Harry for help. 

“Look!” Harry said. “Madam Pince’s done.”

Hermione seemed to be momentarily distracted as the thin, irritable witch who looked like an underfed vulture stared them down, extending her hand for the piece for parchment Hermione had had Lockhart signed so they could enter the Restricted Section. 

Harry gulped as Madam Pince’s greying, bushy eyebrow arched at them in suspicion, her thin lips crisping. Sometimes Harry had the impression that the librarian was a tamer, just as scary female version of Snape. 

“Moste Potente Potions?” She repeated the name of the book Hermione had written on the parchment, trying to take the note from the girl’s greedy fingers. 

“I was wondering if I could keep it.” Hermione said breathlessly, her blush intensifying. 

“Oh, come on,” Ron complained, wrenching it from Hermione’s grasp and thrusting it indelicately at Madam Pince. “We’ll get you another autograph. Lockhart’ll sign anything if it stands still long enough.” 

Madam Pince held the note up to the light, as though determined to detect a forgery, but it passed her test — to her apparent dismay. She stalked between the lofty shelves and returned several minutes later carrying a large and mouldy-looking book. Hermione put it carefully into her bag and, when Madam Pince gestured for them to leave her library, she smiled sheepishly. 

“We actually have some homework to do, Madam Pince.” Hermione said and pushed Harry and Ron into the library. 

They only stopped walking when Hermione found a dusty looking alcove at the far end, closest to the loudest books. Harry grimaced as a bright blue one just above his head made shrieking sounds, followed by sobs and cries. It was no wonder that specific corner was completely deserted, the nearest student sitting a good thirty feet away. 

“Hermione, if this is your way to trick us into doing homework, you have another thing coming…” Ron said, crossing his arms over his chest as Hermione sat cross-legged on the floor, opening the book on the index. 

“Don’t be thick, Ronald.” She snapped at him, apparently still mad. “Ah! Here it is!” She exclaimed excitedly, lowering her voice when a bunch of first-years passed distractedly by their small alcove. 

She was pointing at a double page with the title Polyjuice Potion. Those were decorated with drawings of people halfway through the transformation into other people, and Harry sincerely hoped the artist had imagined the looks of intense pain on their faces. 

“This is the most complicated potion I’ve ever seen!” Hermione commented as she skimmed through the recipe. “It’ll be a shame no one will know I managed to brew it.” She said upset, and Ron rolled his eyes over her head as he, too, read the small letters on the yellowed pages. “Lacewig flied, leeches, fluxweed, and knotgrass. Well, they’re easy enough, they’re in the student store cupboard, we can simply help ourselves… Oooh, look, powdered horn of a bicorn — I don’t even know where we’re going to get that — shredded skin of a boomslang — that’ll be tricky, too, and of course a bit of whoever we want to change into.”

“Excuse me?!” Ron said sharply. “What do you mean, a bit of whoever we’re changing into? I’m not drinking anything with — I don’t know — Crabbe’s toenails in it —”

Hermione continued speaking as thought she hadn’t heard Ron at all. 

“We don’t have to worry about any of that yet, though, because we add those bits last…”

Ron eyed Harry worriedly, and he returned the look with one of his own. He just shook his head at Ron, though, knowing that Hermione wouldn’t appreciate any questioning of her anymore. 

“Do you realise how much we’re going to have to actually steal, Hermione?” He asked tentatively. “Shredded skin of a boomslang, that’s definitely not in the student’s cupboard. What’re we going to do? Break into Snape’s private stores? He will skin us alive if we get caught!”

Hermione shut the book with a snap, startling Harry’s mouth shut. 

“Well, if you two are going to chicken out, then fine!” She said, a bit too loudly. There were bright pink patches on her cheeks and her eyes shone brighter than usual. Harry saw Ron recoiling at the blunt display of — insane — emotion. “I don’t particularly like breaking rules, you know? But I think that having Nott roaming these hallways and… and using his childish pranks to mask the threat that he actually is, is far worse than brewing up a difficult potion — one, I might add, none other second-year students would ever attempt. Nott included! But if you don’t want to find out if it’s Nott, I’ll just go straight to Madam Pince and hand the book back in.”

Harry and Ron simply stared at one another, not knowing what to say. 

“Well —” Ron stuttered, shrugging “I never thought I’d see the day when you’d be persuading us to break the rules.” He said lamely. “Alright, we’ll do it. But… don’t go on another rant, Hermione. It was quite scary.”

“Honestly, Ronald —!”

“How long will it take us to brew, anyway?” Harry intervened before another fight could break loose. 

“Well, since the fluxweed has got to be picked at the full moon and the lacewings have got to be stewed for twenty-one days… I’d say it will take me about a month to finish, if we can get all the ingredients.”

“A month?” Ron asked. “Malfoy can attack half the Muggle-Borns in the school by then!”

“Nott!” Hermione corrected him nastily, getting up. “You and Harry will write down all the ingredients we will be needing and the procedure. I’m not sure we’re allowed to take the book with us. Meanwhile, I will be searching for information about Nott’s mother to prove that I’ve been right all along.”

She didn’t give them a chance to answer before she strutted away huffing, her bushy, frizzled hair bouncing on her back and her feet clacking against the floor. 

“I’m telling you, Harry, Hermione will lose it.” Ron said as he stared at their friend’s retreating form, tiny among the tall shelves. “She’s acting even crazier than the year before. It’s like she wants Nott to be this bloody heir.” 

Harry nodded absently, silently agreeing with Ron. 

But, then again, anyone was acting crazier than the year before. Himself included. There hasn’t been a second gone by in which Harry hadn’t been reliving every minute of his year since that bloody elf appeared in his bedroom, warning him not to go to Hogwarts. 

He had wondered if maybe Dobby, the House-Elf, had not been sent as a prank, but as a warning. He had wondered if, somewhere he didn’t know, there was someone looking out for him, making sure he remained safe despite what kept being thrown at him. 

He had dismissed this notion immediately. Dismissed the option of him having an ounce of luck. 

The moments in which he felt genuine happiness were becoming even fewer and further between, not even Quidditch bringing the joy and the sense of freedom, Harry had found in the sport the year before. All he had known since the beginning of summer vacations was stress, fear, and anger. And he knew himself not to be the only one. 

Ron was right. Hermione was going to drive herself crazy sooner rather than latter if she continued the way she was going. Harry had never seen her so desperate. He was used to an anxious Hermione studying until the early hours of the morning, not one close to tears every time they came back from lessons, one almost ripping her hair from her scalp as she read the used pages of books so heavy his friend has been walking hunched even when not carrying her bag.  

He had become accustomed to a Hermione that would tell him to leave matters to the adults, and push him to focus on his studies alone. Not a Hermione that was as obsessive as him; a Hermione who would do anything — even suggest breaking school rules — so she could prove Nott’s involvement on a crime; and not because she was driven to do the right thing to save future innocent victims, but because she has been dreaming of the day McGonagall would report Nott’s expulsion, and Hermione’s consequential return to her pedestal. 

“I’m actually feeling bad for Nott if it turns out she’s wrong.” Ron commented as he flipped down on the floor and took a partially clean parchment from his bag, starting to copy the ingredients of the Polyjuice Potion in a messy scrawl. “Merlin knows what she’d do then.”

“I still think it’s Malfoy.” Harry said, sitting beside his friend. 

“I’m right there with you, mate. Dad reckons the Malfoys have been Slytherins for generations. And hunting down children is right there in Lucius Malfoy’s alley.” 

“I thought so. He was so creepy that day in Diagon Alley. Not even Malfoy escaped his rage.”

“What do you mean?” Ron asked, mouthing a word before frowning and writing it down. 

“He was very mean to Malfoy at Borgin & Burke’s. Almost as if he was mocking him.” Harry said, remembering his shock at seeing Malfoy glaring at his father, the way Mr. Malfoy had shamed his own son in front of the owner of the store. 

The way Malfoy had smiled openly when Nott’s mother humiliated his father. 

“That’s certainly news.” Ron commented. “Malfoy acts so much like a spoiled brat. I thought he idolised his father.”

“Me too.” 

“Why do you reckon his father bought all those brooms to the Slytherin team, then?”

“To antagonise, maybe?” Harry suggested helplessly. “I thought McGonagall was going to cry when Wood told her.” 

“Maybe.” Ron conceded. “The game against Slytherin is coming up. Maybe you should knock Malfoy off his broom to make our lives easier.” Ron grew quiet before continuing, his tone more careful. “You reckon Gryffindor has a change to win?”

“We’ve training very hard, and Wood has —”

“Really, don’t boys talk of anything other than Quidditch? The game isn’t even that interesting.” Hermione dropped all the books and pages of newspaper she had in her arms on the floor with a bang, sitting next to them and ignoring the loathing glare Ron sent her way. “This, though, is.”

Harry peered at the book on Hermione’s lap, furrowing his brow as he read The Secret Twenty-Eight. The cover was completely black, the writing done in polished, silver letters. It looked expensive and, unlike the majority of the other books found in the Hogwarts library, this one looked new, as if it had never been opened — or as if it had been spelled to remain intact. 

Harry felt a strange twinge on his fingers as he made to touch it, and instinct told him it was magic what he was sensing. It was also instinct that made Harry’s stomach recoil. 

His intake of breath failed slightly as he read the name written in small capitals on the column of the book: Cantankerous Nott. 

“Why’d read this rubbish, Hermione?” Ron asked, his nose scrunching up in disgust. “Dad says this is complete trash — Pureblood supremacy trash.” 

“Try not to be so narrow-sighted, Ronald.” Hermione said snappily. “This book lists the most ancient Pureblood families in Wizarding Britain and gives an insight into each of them. Nott’s descendent wrote it and, as you said it yourself, this is the physical concretisation of the Pureblood ideals.” 

“That’s not exactly brand-new information, Hermione.” Ron spat back at her, his tone frustrated as he looked pointedly at Harry, as if that was the proof that Hermione wasn’t in her right mind anymore. 

“I’m not yet done, Ronald.” Hermione hissed at him, completely ignoring the redhead as she turned fully to Harry, as if he was the only one there. Harry sighed. He would have walked away if he wasn’t interested in what they were doing, tired of being thrown in the middle of Ron and Hermione’s bickering. He couldn’t stand it anymore. “It also says that, from all the families, only a selected few have refused to mingle with wizards and witches of Muggle heritage. They resorted to inbreeding just to keep their lines pure — completely disgusting and unreasonable if you ask me. The genetic flaws that can be caused by inbreeding are endless —”

“This year, Hermione.” Ron reminded her exasperated, and Hermione again pretended he wasn’t there. 

“The Notts, Malfoys, Blacks, Carrows, Averys, Yaxleys and tones of others have done it, Harry.” She said his name pointedly, jabbing at Ron, who Harry noticed was clenching his jaw. Harry rolled his eyes, nodding at Hermione to just get on with it already. “Blood supremacy is that important to them and most of those families have been recorded to have all members sorted into Slytherin for literally generations. Any of them can be a ramification of the Slytherin line, perhaps even more than one.”

“It still doesn’t narrow it down, Hermione.” Harry rubbed a hand down his face. “We aren’t any closer to finding out if the heir is Nott or Malfoy.”

“This here might, though.” Hermione said, holding a stack of newspaper victoriously in one hand. 

DISOWNED YAXLEY HEIRESS SENTENCED TO LIFE IN AZKABAN AFTER FOUND GUILTY OF MASS MURDER IN MUGGLE LONDON 

RAVENNA YAXLEY FOUND INNOCENT 

RAVENNA YAXLEY CARRIED OUT OF AZKABAN BY FIANCÉE LORCAN NOTT

WIZEGAMOT APOLOGISES FORMALLY FOR THE HASTY AND UNFOUNDED INCARCERATION OF RAVENNA YAXLEY 

Harry’s eyes widened as he read the titled of the articles Hermione was showing him, his gaze unwavering as he read and reread ‘mass murder in Muggle London’. 

“Ravenna Yaxley is Nott’s mother’s maiden name.” Hermione explained the obvious, seeming all too pleased considering what they had just found out. Ron was staring at her open-mouthed, his face pale as he shook his head slowly, as if rewinding it before focusing once more on their grinning friend — and the newspaper she was waving as if it was a flag, as if she was cheering a team on. 

“W-What’s…“ Harry wetted his lips with the tip of his tongue — they had gone completely dry. “What’s Azkaban?”

“It’s the Wizarding prison.” Ron answered him, his tone grave. More serious than Harry could ever remember hearing. “It’s… it’s like a stone fortress on an island… in the middle of the North Sea. Dad says the sea there is so violent that no Muggle has ever ventured that far and survived to tell the story. It’s guarded by this… this creatures — they say they suck happiness so the prisoners will have no will left to live, least of all to try to escape.”

“And Nott’s mother’s been there?” Harry asked, horrified, unable to imagine the witch — the tall, proud witch, whom he had compared to a queen — in prisoner robes, locked inside a cell. 

“Arrested, yes.” Hermione said, a giddy glint in her eyes that bothered Harry. “I’ve just skimmed through the articles, but I know she stayed there for three whole months for supposedly killing a bunch of people in the middle of a Muggle street.” 

“But she was found innocent?” Harry asked dumbly, seeing Ron frowning to the side. 

“How come mom still calls her a criminal, then?”

“I don’t know for sure.” Hermione waves off their doubts. “But that doesn’t matter much. What’s important is that she was accused and she spent three months in prison, having to be carried out of there by her husband. That has to have been humiliating for a woman like her, to say the least. And her maiden name is Yaxley.”

“Oh, blimey!” Ron exclaimed loudly, being shushed by the Ravenclaw girl furiously scribbling in a parchment in the nearest table to them. “Merlin — Yaxley! Dad has talked about a Yaxley before — he’s a high position in the Ministry, like Lucius Malfoy. And he was also a You-Know-Who follower!”

“And they are inbreeding Pureblood supremacists.” Hermione added excitedly. “They could very well be derived from the Slytherin line, which would make Nott the younger descendant and the heir. And his mother’s arrest — a crime committed in a Muggle area and judged after the Light Side won the war— would be the perfect reason for him to open the Chamber!” 

“I-I… it’s starting to make a lot of sense.” Harry admitted, feeling somewhat defeated. 

“And there’s more.” Hermione said triumphantly. “I know for a fact that Nott’s mother has connections in the Muggle world, which gives her an origin for her hatred — a hatred she passed on to her son.” 

“Spill it out already, Hermione. Blimey!” Ron snapped at her, mumbling to Harry, “She shouldn’t be enjoying it as much as she is.”

“I didn’t know until now that Ravenna Nott is, in fact, Ravenna Yaxley. Had I known it, I could have made the connection sooner.” Hermione ranted to herself, banging herself in the head. “When we’re in Diagon Alley together, my mother thought she recognised Nott’s mother. I dismissed it immediately, of course. A Pureblood Lady like Mrs. Nott would logically never roam Muggle Britain, and my mother was only then stepping foot in the Wizarding World for the first time. I thought it impossible that the two could’ve ever met, and when my mother called her Ravenna Yaxley I told her she was wrong.”

Hermione ran out of breath for speaking non-stop, her face flushed. She inhaled deeply once before continuing in the same frantic pace. 

“Ravenna Yaxley was a model in the Muggle world — a very famous one at that.” Harry chocked on his own saliva as Ron snapped his head up so fast that he stumped it on the shelf behind him. “My mother said she started around 1978 and modelled for the best brands there were until 1980, when she vanished. Now I know why — she was serving her time in Azkaban. My mother said companies’ve looked for Ravenna for years. Apparently, she was a big hit. Everyone wanted her to model for them. Can you believe that my mother was a fan? Before the fight started that day at Flourish and Blotts, she was going to ask for an autograph. That would’ve been so humiliating for me.”

Harry had stopped listening. 

Everything seemed to always come back to 1980. Mrs. Nott’s arrest. His birth. His parent’s death. Voldemort’s defeat. Him having been dropped at the Durleys’ doorstep at three months of age.

As Ron and Hermione restarted bickering, Harry leaned his back against the shelf, the sounds of the sobbing book being easily swallowed by the thundering raging in his mind. He had tried with all his might not to dwell on Nott’s mother after finding out that she probably couldn’t care less about him. He had been satisfied to discover that she was not well-liked; it had been enough that everyone already seemed to know that she was a Dark Witch. 

But his questions had never faded, they had just been silenced. And now they were screaming at him. 

Mrs. Nott had been labelled a murderer by Mrs. Weasley. She had been prosecuted as a murderer and condemned for it. Yet, she had been somehow found innocent — which Harry couldn’t be sure was the truth or yet another elaborate lie, like the one her husband told to escape Azkaban himself. But even if the mass murder hadn’t been her work, people still died. Innocent people still died. 

Harry just wanted to know who they were — to know what they did, if they had family, if they had somehow crossed Ravenna Yaxley when she was younger and ended up paying the price. 

And, a small voice reminded Harry, a person could be a murderer without having delivered the killing blow. Even if Nott’s mother hadn’t been splashed with the blood of her victims or seen the life diminishing from their eyes, she could have still been behind it. She could’ve still ordered it to be done on her behalf. And if that was the case, then Harry would hate her even more than he already did. 

Harry debated if he should get out of the bed when Saturday morning came. Even from the tower, he could tell the sun was barely providing any light outside, buried behind grey clouds, with a hint of thunder in the air. 

Slytherin had the best brooms on the British market. They were the fastest and Ron had told him that it is a strategy of professional teams to have all their players mounting the same broomsticks. Harry couldn’t see any positive side. Wood was wrong when he claimed that talent would bend the scale in their favour. 

As eleven o’clock approached, the whole school was but a giggling patchwork blanket, all the students synchronised as they made their way to the Quidditch Pitch. Harry was walking with Ron and Hermione towards the locker rooms, his two best friends having come under the pretence of wishing him good luck. Harry was grateful for their presence. Ron’s incessant chatter about his thoughts on the game was relieving his anxiety slightly, but he knew Ron just wanted to catch a glimpse at what Wood had planned, and Hermione had no other option but to follow him if she didn’t want to stay alone in the Gryffindor stands. 

They were almost there when Hermione suddenly stopped, motioning for them to hush as she silently snook behind the Slytherin coloured curtain outside the snake’s locker room. 

Harry shrugged at Ron before following her, and his eyes widened as he found Nott and Malfoy with their heads close together, clearly not wanting their conversation to be overheard. 

“I saw him, Theo.” Malfoy was whispering furiously, looking the most unnerved Harry has ever seen him. “My father is on the stands. I thought he’d be in France until after Christmas! Why would he come to Hogwarts at all? It’s not like he cares.”

Harry sucked in a breath. Lucius Malfoy would be watching the game. 

“He’s just here to get to you.” Nott said back, his tone invoking no room for questioning. “And you can’t let him, Draco. Just win the game so you can rub it in his face later.”

“Easier said than done.” Malfoy mumbled. “I hope Potter’d fall off his broom and not stand up anymore.”

“Potter is half-blind and I think it’s going to rain.” Nott deadpanned, and Harry could practically feel the smirk on his voice. “The chances of that actually happening are higher than Gryffindor winning the game.”

Malfoy laughed loudly, and Harry hated that Nott had succeeded in putting the blond at ease. 

“But remember, Drakey —” Nott said, a hint of mockery on his words that had Malfoy huffing amusedly.

“You’re never letting me live that down, are you?” Malfoy sighed. 

“Not a chance, bro.” Nott chuckled, his laugh like a bark. “And neither is my sister, by the way. But seriously, though, focus on the game. You’re far better than Potter — you’ve been flying since you’re what — three? Catch the Snitch first and worry about taking the mickey off Potter later.”

“Obviously.” Malfoy drawled. “And I’ve been flying since I was two, you wanker. Way sooner than you.”

“Not my fault my mom wouldn’t let me down from her lap until I became too heavy for her.” Nott rolled his eyes, looking towards the stands when Lee Jordan loudly announced the match would start in ten minutes. “Good luck out there, bro.” 

“As if I need any luck.” Malfoy said, but then he surprised Harry by giving Nott an one arm hug. “Thanks, though.”

“Ew, far to sappy, Drakey. I’m going now.”

“You gonna be with Zabini on the stands?” Malfoy asked as an after-thought when Nott was leaving. 

“Nah.” Nott shrugged. “McGonagall doesn’t trust me not to do anything. Smart of her, though — I was just thinking about setting your father’s hair on fire.” The two Slytherins chuckled under their breath. “McGonagall saved me a seat next to her. That witch loves me, I’m telling you.”

“Yeah, she’d love to bury you, that’s for sure.” 

“She would miss me too much.” Were Nott’s parting words as he stalked back towards the noise, his combat boots cracking dry leaves as he went. 

Malfoy entered the Slytherin locker room quietly, all the nervousness Harry had detected in him earlier completely vanished. The blond would walk into the field with his head cleared, which was more than Harry could say for himself. 

Nott’s words kept replaying on his mind, in sync with his thundering heartbeat. Malfoy has been flying since he was two. Harry couldn’t even walk when he was that age. The weather was not on his favour either. If the first droplets of rain actually fell as Nott predicted, then his sight would be yet another sense turned useless when playing Quidditch. 

He barely said goodbye to Ron and Hermione, his bushy-haired friend pouting, as if about to throw a tantrum for not having Nott and Malfoy planning how to strike their next Muggle-Born victim out in the open when a bunch of students could walk in on them any minute. 

As Harry entered his locker room, his team was already grimily pulling on their scarlet Gryffindor robes, and he sat down quietly before a crestfallen looking Katie Bell as they focused on their Capitan, ready to listen to Wood’s usual pre-match pep talk. 

“Slytherin has better brooms than us.” Oliver began. “No point denying it. But we’ve got better people on our brooms. We’ve trained harder than they have, we’ve been flying in all weathers, and we’re going to make them rue the day they let that little bit of slime, Malfoy, buy his way onto their team.” His face was red in anger and his chest was heaving as Wood turned to Harry, who groaned quietly. He knew what was coming. Oliver has been repeating the same thing since they saw Malfoy zooming past them on his Nimbus Two Thousand and One — nothing but a blur. “It’ll be down to you, Harry, to show them that a Seeker has to have something more than a rich father. Get to that Snitch before Malfoy or die trying, Harry, because we’ve got to win today, we’ve got to.”

“So no pressure, Harry.” Said Fred, winking at him. 

Harry scowled back at both the twins. 

As they walked out onto the pitch, a roar of noise greeted them, mainly cheers. Harry noticed with a smile that both Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff were anxious to see Slytherin beaten. None of the teams were satisfied  with the seven new additions to Slytherin and, Harry reasoned, if Gryffindor won against them, then the other two Houses wouldn’t have to worry as much. 

Harry was floating above when Madam Hooch asked Wood and Flint to shake hands in the middle of the field, both captains the only players still on solid ground. Harry rolled his eyes as the two boys seized one another, their hands limb next to their bodies as they refused to touch. 

Harry took the time to squint into the stands, where he found Lucius Malfoy’s white-blond hair shining next to Snape where the professors usually sat and, a few benches below the two of them, next to where Lee Jordan had his eyes wide as he stared ahead with his hand clutched tightly around the enchanted loudspeaker used to narrate the matches, were Professor McGonagall and Nott. 

He frowned upon noticing the other two actually talking. The barely-there smile playing on McGonagall’s lips as she sent an exasperated glare in Nott’s direction. Harry wished he could hear what the boy said next, as McGonagall jumped slightly in place, spelling the rips on Nott’s jeans closed while he laughed, yelping when the Transfiguration Professor slapped him half-heartedly across the head. 

Madam Hooch’s loud voice brought Harry’s attention to where Flint and Wood were giving each other threatening glares, gripping each other’s hands as if they were trying to tear them from the other’s bodies. 

“On my whistle!” Yelled Madam Hooch. “Three… two… one… !”

With a roar from the crowd, the fourteen players zoomed to their positions, Harry flying higher than any of them and squinting around for the Golden Snitch. 

On the other side of the pitch, Malfoy was doing the same, his grey orbs going from one end of the field to the other almost as fast as the Snitch could move, and Harry grew apprehensive. He was indeed not playing his odds against a talentless Seeker — perhaps far from that. 

He should have taken Nott’s words seriously when he bragged in the woods. 

Malfoy noticed Harry watching him and smirked in his direction, “Alright there, Scarheard?” he yelled, shooting to the side and coming back to his position, as if to show off the speed of his broom. 

Harry had no time to reply. At that very moment, a heavy black Bludger came pelting toward him; he avoided it narrowly, but only just so. He felt it ruffle his hair as it passed. 

“Close one, Harry!” George said as he streaked past Harry with his bat in hand, ready to knock the Bludger back towards a Slytherin. Harry watched as George gave the Bludger a powerful whack in the direction of Adrian Pucey, but the Bludger changed its path in midair and shot straight back for Harry again. 

Harry dropped quickly to avoid it once more, and George managed to hit it hard enough towards Malfoy. The blond went immediately higher at the sight of the heavy ball approaching him, but he needn’t. Once more, the Bludger swerved like a boomerang and shot at Harry’s head. 

Harry put a burst of speed and zoomed toward the other end of the pitch, finding the Snitch forgotten for the moment. He could only hope Malfoy also wasn’t having any luck. He could hear the Bludger whistling along behind him, his mind screaming at him that something was not right. 

In all his time playing, Bludgers have never concentrated on one player like this; Wood had said the first time he talked to Harry about Quidditch that a Bludger’s job was to try and unseat as many people as possible. This simply shouldn’t be happening. 

Fred was waiting for the Bludger at the other end, and Harry ducked just as Fred swung at the Bludger with a spin, hitting the ball with all the strength he could manage, and the Bludger was again knocked off course. 

“Gotcha!” Fred yelled happily, but, like his twin, he was wrong; as though it was magnetically attracted to Harry, the Bludger pelted after him once more and Harry was forced to fly at a full speed to escape. 

Somewhere below him, he heard more speeding, and he panicked when the Slytherins on the stands roared at once. Stealing a glance as fast as he could, Harry saw a blurry form with white-blond hair zigzagging up the length of the Gryffindor's main ring, almost bumping into Oliver as he continued towards the sky. 

Harry’s jaw dropped. 

Malfoy was flaying completely vertical with one hand reaching for the — to Harry — invisible golden ball speeding in front of him. Harry has never attempted to fly that way, not when there was such a thing as gravity in effect. He couldn’t begin to imagine how strained the muscles in Malfoy’s legs must be. 

Harry sighed in relieved when he heard Malfoy’s loud growl of defeat. The Golden Snitch had disappeared before the blond could catch it, but he had been close. Extremely so.

It was only then that he realised it had started to rain; Harry felt heavy drops falling onto his face, splattering onto his glasses and effectively blurring his vision, rendering him half-blind just as Nott had predicted. He didn’t have any idea what was going on in the rest of the game until he heard  Lee Jordan dejectedly commenting through the speaker, “Slytherin on the lead, sixty points to zero”.

If Malfoy’s hidden talent wasn’t enough, the Slytherin’s superior brooms were clearly doing their jobs, and meanwhile the mad Bludger was doing all it could to knock Harry out of the air. Fred and George were now flying so close to him on either side that Harry could see nothing at all except their flailing arms and had no chance to even look for the Snitch which had escaped Malfoy, let alone catch it. 

“Someone’s tempered with the Bludger.” Fred grunted each word, swinging his bat back and forth and the Bludger launched new attacks at Harry. 

“We need a time out.” George said, trying to signal to Wood and stop the Bludger from breaking Harry’s nose at the same time. 

Oliver had obviously gotten the message, as Madam Hooch’s whistle rang out and Harry, Fred, and George dived for the ground, still trying to save their heads from the mad Bludger. 

“What’s going on?” Wood demanded while the Slytherins jeered loudly, tautly, behind their backs. “We’re being flattened. Fred, George, where were you when that Bludger stopped Angelina scoring?!”

“We’re twenty feet above her, stopping the other Bludger from murdering Harry, Wood.” George spat angrily. “Someone’s tempered with it — it won’t leave Harry alone. It hasn’t gone for anyone else all game. The Slytherins must have down something to it.”

“That can’t be. The Bludgers have been locked in Madam Hooch’s office since our last practice, and there was nothing wrong with them then…” Oliver said anxiously, eyes widening comically as Madam Hooch walked towards them. Over her shoulder, the Slytherins were jeering and pointing at him, Malfoy doing some cheap imitation of what Harry reckoned had been his facial expression when the first Bludger came for him. 

Nobody else seemed to have caught on — and the Slytherins obviously wouldn’t be telling. Harry stole a glance at the stands and found McGonagall looking dismayed as Nott patted her on the arm with a smirk on his face. Harry could see the other boy’s lips moving, probably saying something nasty, as the Transfiguration Professor slapped his hand away from her and forcefully sat him down on the bench. Harry thought he caught her smirking when McGonagall waved her wand and an invisible umbrella covered both her and Lee, leaving Nott to be soaked. 

Harry wouldn’t give Malfoy and Nott the satisfaction of asking for the game to be stopped. He wouldn’t give them the satisfaction of not handling the mad Bludger. 

“Listen,” Harry said quickly as Madam Hooch came nearer and nearer, “with you two flying around me all the time the only way I’m going to catch the Snitch is if it flied up my sleeve. Go back to the rest of the team and let me deal with the rogue Bludger on my own.”

“Don’t be thick.” Fred said. “It’ll take your head off.”

Wood was looking from Harry to the twins, the only one who seemed to be actually considering what Harry had suggested. 

“Oliver, this is insane.” Alicia Spinner said angrily. “You can’t let Harry deal with that thing on his own. He is a second-year, for Godric’s sake! Let’s ask for an inquiry —”

“If we stop now, we’ll have to forfeit the match!” Harry said, just as angrily as her. “And we’re not losing to Slytherin just because of a crazy Bludger! Come on, Oliver, tell them to leave me alone!”

“This is all your fault.” George hissed at Oliver. “‘Get the Snitch or die trying’ what a stupid thing to tell him —”

Madam Hooch finally joined them, “Ready to resume playing?” she asked Wood.

Wood glanced at Harry once more, seeing the determined look on his face, “Alright.” He said. “Fred, George, you heard Harry — leave him alone and let him deal with the Bludger on his own.”

The rain was falling even more heavily now. On Madam Hooch’s whistle, Harry kicked hard into the air and heard the telltale whoosh of the Bludger behind him. Higher and higher Harry climbed; he looped and swooped, spiralled, zigzagged, and rolled. Slightly dizzy, he nevertheless kept his eyes wide open, rain speckling his glasses and ran up his nostrils as he hung upside down, avoiding yet another fierce dive from the Bludger. He could hear laughter from the crowd; he knew he must look stupid, but the rogue Bludger was heavy and couldn’t change directions as quickly as Harry could. 

He began a kind of rollercoaster ride around the edges of the pitch, squinting through the silver sheets of rain to the Gryffindor goal posts, where Adrian Pucey was trying to get past Wood to score yet another goal for Slytherin. 

A whistling in Harry’s ear told him the Bludger had just missed him again. He turned right over and sped in the opposite direction. As Harry was forced to do a stupid kind of twirl in midair to dodge the Bludger again, and fled, the Bludger trailing behind him, he saw the end of Malfoy’s robes in front of him, and heard the chirping-like noise of the Golden Snitch near him. 

Malfoy was chasing the Snitch. As soon as the blond closed his fist around it the match would come to an end. Harry couldn’t let that happen.

Harry dodged the Bludger one more time and sped after Malfoy, finding himself lucky when the Golden Snitch dove ten feet in seconds and turned. Malfoy cursed loudly as he made a clean dive after the small ball, his body hanging from the side of the broom as he made a sudden turn, back on the Snitch’s path. But he had lost his advantage. 

The Snitch had backtracked and Harry was now closer to it. 

Harry cursed Malfoy’s father for buying him that broom when the blond appeared beside him mere seconds later, his shoulder bumping on Harry’s so hard — and on propose — that he winced. 

“Training for the ballet, Potter?” Malfoy yelled, his voice strained as he pushed his broom to its maximum capacity, inching forward and stretching his arm. He was trying to distract Harry, but it wouldn’t work. Not this time. 

Harry inched forward on his broom, barely any space left for him to hold on to, but Malfoy’s arm was longer than his. 

He had stupidly forgotten about the Bludger, too focused on winning, and his eyes widened in both fear and anticipation of pain when he heard the heavy ball cutting through the air, and coming closer. It was a second later that he realised it was coming from the wrong side and, as it clashed, it wasn’t Harry’s body which was hit. 

Malfoy grunted loudly, his pain escaping him in the form of a scream as the Bludger smashed full force on his shoulder. Harry was sure he heard bone cracking. And as Malfoy was thrown off balance, as the blond almost fell from his broom, only his legs holding him in place as he cradled his injured arm with the other, Harry was jerked to the side with the impact, just in time for his hand to close around the cold Snitch. He had no time to celebrate, though. 

He was sitting wrongly on his broom, his weight not well distributed and his hands with no leverage to hold on. With a splattering thud, both he and Malfoy hit the mud, rolling off their brooms. Harry landed on his arm, which was now dangling at a very strange angle. 

Riddled with pain, he heard, as though from a distance, a good deal of whistling and shouting. Harry smiled through the throbbing pain of his wrist, clutching the Golden Snitch secured in his good hand. 

“Aha.” He said vaguely, eyes looking for Malfoy. “We’ve won.” 

Both the teams landed on the ground, Fred and George zooming around the three Slytherin Chasers as the snakes sneered at them. Harry felt satisfaction swelling inside him as the stands erupted in cheers and students filled the pitch. He startled when Oliver pulled him forcefully up, not caring that he was smashing Harry’s broken wrist with his iron grip. But he was thankful for it when the mad Bludger opened a hole on the grass — exactly where Harry had been lying. 

Harry’s dizziness, his joy over winning dimmed and he realised that the cheers have stopped, and that his team hadn't flown down to congratulate him. 

Slytherin and Gryffindor were fighting in the middle of the Quidditch pitch, the professors and Madam Hooch walking quickly towards the commotion as a very wet, very angry-looking Theo Nott ran ahead, sliding on his knees through the mud as he came to an abrupt stop beside Malfoy, whose hair was completely tainted brown after having rolled around clutching his shoulder and ribs. 

“It’s coming back!” Malfoy yelled. “Duck, duck, duck!” Everyone who was near, Harry included, did as Malfoy said, except for Nott. 

Nott rolled his eyes at the scene and ran to where the Weasley twins were having a screaming match with Adrian Pucey and a tall Slytherin covered in acne Harry never bothered to learn the name of. 

“Give me this shit, Weasel.” Nott hissed as he wretched the bat from George’s fingers and straightened his shoulders. 

“Theo, don’t be fucking stupid!” Malfoy hissed as he struggled to get up on his own, being supported by Flit. 

Harry felt Wood sucking in a shaky breath behind him as Nott swung the bat in an arch just as the Bludger zoomed pass him — again aiming for Harry’s general direction — and hit it square in the middle, craving it in the ground below. The strike had been so fast, the hole it dug so narrow yet perfectly shaped, that the Bludger stayed stuck on the earth. 

Nott then took out his wand and, after brushing his wet hair away from his eyes, he aimed it at the ball, “Finite!” he exclaimed, and the Bludger stopped tussling.

Madam Hooch arrived, then, taking in the sight with a gaping mouth. 

“I demand a rematch!” Flit screamed, still supporting Malfoy’s weight as he came closer to where the flying instructor stopped near Harry and Oliver. “That Bludger’s clearly been tempered with! It hit my Seeker just as he was about to catch the Snitch!”

“In your dreams, Flit!” Wood screamed back, tossing Harry indelicately against a seething Angelina as both the teams assembled on either side of Madam Hooch. “The Bludger was after Harry and he still caught the Snitch! Gryffindor won fair and square!” 

“Potter wouldn’t have caught shit if Draco hadn’t been hit!” Flit argued forcefully, digging a finger in Wood’s chest. “A tempered Bludger broke my Seeker’s ribs and shoulder. We have the right to a rematch!” 

“Pretty words coming from the git who fixed the Bludger!” George snapped at Flint, pushing Pucey out of his way. 

“You’re just throwing a fit because you lost!” Fred said. 

“As if we would need a fixed Bludger to win against you!” Pucey sneered back at George, pushing the redhead with both arms, making George stumble onto his twin. “The Gryffindor team is a joke!” 

“Everybody settle down this instant!” Madam Hooch roared. “While I don’t believe it to have been a Slytherin who jinxed the equipment, I will personally investigate it. Unless I find proof of foul play by one of the teams, I’m issuing a rematch.”

“A rematch?!” Angelina cried out. “That’s not fair! Gryffindor won!”

“Won my ass.” Nott drawled, appearing beside Malfoy, wand dangling between his fingers. “You’ve been flying like a bunch of double-sighted gnomes the whole game.”

“And what’re you doing here, Nott?” Fred demanded. “You’re not even part of the team!”

“Lucky for you, isn’t it?” Nott deadpanned, a mean, mischievous glint in his silver eyes. “I did in less than a second what you failed to do the whole match.”

“Enough!” Professor McGonagall arrived, her voice snappy and robes completely drenched. The brim of her hat was comically veiling her eyes. “Mr. Nott, stop antagonising other students if you don’t want another week of detention.”

“They started it!” Nott protested. 

“And I’m finishing it!” McGonagall hissed at him. “You all heard Madam Hooch. A rematch will be rescheduled due to the rather… unique circumstances of what took place here today. The culprit will be found and punished accordingly.”

“But Professor —!”

“No ‘buts’, Wood. It has been decided.” McGonagall then turned to Nott, who was still sulking next to her. “Fifteen points to Slytherin, Mr. Nott, for using advanced magic to get rid of the Bludger attacking Mr. Potter.”

“As if I’d ever help fucking Potter.” Nott mumbled. 

“Language, Theo. I can change my mind any time.” Her voice was again levelled as she turned back to the two captains. “I’ll announce the date of the rematch as soon as —“

“No rematch will be needed, Minerva.” Dumbledore said with a small, grandfather-like smile. From all the adults surrounded them, the Headmaster was the only one composed. There was not a single drop staining his bright purple robes, not a single white hair out of place. “From where I was standing, Mr. Potter followed through with the game even when chased after by the apparently fixed Bludger and no rematch was offered. I don’t see why Mr. Malfoy should be gifted such privilege when the two Seekers pursued the Snitch under the same conditions.”

“That’s bullshit!” Nott protested. 

“As it is,” Harry grinned widely when Dumbledore completely ignored the other boy, “I believe Gryffindor should be celebrating.”

Dumbledore retreated from the pitch with his hands behind his back, smile still in place. No Professor dared contradict him, even if Harry noticed all of them staring bewildered at the headmaster. 

Harry didn’t care. He cheered with his team as the twins led the celebration scream, winking at the gaping Slytherins — who, for the first time, seemed to have the support of the other Houses as Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws gathered around them, all of them with deep frowns as they awkwardly patted the Slytherins on their backs. Flit was still trying to convince Madam Hooch, but Harry saw the flying instructor continuously shaking her head at him. 

Harry froze, though, when Nott appeared beside him and slung an arm lazily around his shoulder, Malfoy flanking his other side — still holding his own arm close to his body. 

“Professor Lockhart, sir.” Nott called the Defence Against the Dark Arts Professor, who was looking lost among the sea of students who had come down from the stands. “Would you mind taking a look at Potter’s wrist? I think it’s broken. We would hate to have him missing Gryffindor's victory party.”

“Yes, Professor.” Malfoy agreed promptly. “We’ve read all about your adventures in your books. There is no one better to fix Potter here back into shape.” 

Harry panicked, trying to dodge Nott’s touch, but the Slytherin’s grip on him was iron-clad. 

“Malfoy, stop!” Harry hissed through gritted teeth. 

“Oh, poor Potter.” Malfoy said with mocked sympathy. “He has no idea what he’s saying, professor. I think the pain might be making him delirious.”

“Of course! Not to worry, Harry!” Lockhart said loudly, winking at Harry as they slowly started gathering a crowd. “I’m about to fix your arm.”

“No!” Harry protested, still locked between Nott and Malfoy. “I’ll keep it like this, thanks…”

He again tried to squirm away, frantically looking for Ron and Hermione, but finding his friends nowhere in sight. He heard the familiar clicking noise nearby and groaned, his body shaking in sync with Nott’s bark-like laugh. 

“I don’t want a photo of this, Colin!” Harry moaned loudly. 

“Keep still, Harry.” Lockhart said soothingly, taking Harry’s arm in his hand. Nott and Malfoy finally let go then, knowing that Harry wouldn’t risk jerking away from a professor when so many people were around. “It’s a simple charm I’ve used countless times —”

“Why don’t you fix Malfoy first?” Harry asked through clenched teeth. “I don’t mind going to the Hospital Wing.”

“Stand back!” Lockhart ordered the crowd, completely oblivious to what Harry had said as he rolled up the jade-green sleeves of his robes. 

“No — don’t —” Harry said weakly, but Lockhart was twirling his wand and a second later he directed it straight at Harry’s arm. 

A strange and unpleasant sensation started at Harry’s shoulder and spread all the way down to his fingertips. It felt as though his arm was being deflated. He didn’t dare look at what was happening. He had shut his eyes, his face turned away from his arm, but his worst fears were realised as the people around him gasped and he heard Nott doubling over in laughter. 

Harry’s arms didn’t hurt anymore — nor did it feel remotely like an arm. 

“Oh, Salazar, that’s just priceless!” Nott was saying. “So much better than what I expected.”

“Ah,” said Lockhart “yes. Well, that can sometimes happen. But the point is, the bones are no longer broken. That’s the thing to bear in mind. So, Harry, just toddle up to the hospital wing — ah, Mr. Weasley, Miss Granger, would you escort him? — and Madam Pomfrey will to — er — tidy you up a bit.”

Harry felt strangely lopsided as he met Ron’s horrified stare. 

There was no bone left on his arm. 

Chapter Text

Previous Chapter

“Oh, poor Potter.” Malfoy said with mocked sympathy. “He has no idea what he’s saying, professor. I think the pain might be making him delirious.”

“Of course! Not to worry, Harry!” Lockhart said loudly, winking at Harry as they slowly started gathering a crowd. “I’m about to fix your arm.”

“No!” Harry protested, still locked between Nott and Malfoy. “I’ll keep it like this, thanks…”

He again tried to squirm away, frantically looking for Ron and Hermione, but finding his friends nowhere in sight. He heard the familiar clicking noise nearby and groaned, his body shaking in sync with Nott’s bark-like laugh. 

“I don’t want a photo of this, Colin!” Harry moaned loudly. 

“Keep still, Harry.” Lockhart said soothingly, taking Harry’s arm in his hand. Nott and Malfoy finally let go then, knowing that Harry wouldn’t risk jerking away from a professor when so many people were around. “It’s a simple charm I’ve used countless times —”

“Why don’t you fix Malfoy first?” Harry asked through clenched teeth. “I don’t mind going to the Hospital Wing.”

“Stand back!” Lockhart ordered the crowd, completely oblivious to what Harry had said as he rolled up the jade-green sleeves of his robes. 

“No — don’t —” Harry said weakly, but Lockhart was twirling his wand and a second later he directed it straight at Harry’s arm. 

A strange and unpleasant sensation started at Harry’s shoulder and spread all the way down to his fingertips. It felt as though his arm was being deflated. He didn’t dare look at what was happening. He had shut his eyes, his face turned away from his arm, but his worst fears were realised as the people around him gasped and he heard Nott doubling over in laughter. 

Harry’s arms didn’t hurt anymore — nor did it feel remotely like an arm. 

“Oh, Salazar, that’s just priceless!” Nott was saying. “So much better than what I expected.”

“Ah,” said Lockhart “yes. Well, that can sometimes happen. But the point is, the bones are no longer broken. That’s the thing to bear in mind. So, Harry, just toddle up to the hospital wing — ah, Mr. Weasley, Miss Granger, would you escort him? — and Madam Pomfrey will to — er — tidy you up a bit.”

Harry felt strangely lopsided as he met Ron’s horrified stare. 

There was no bone left on his arm. 

Harry had been investigating it, he had been worried about Hermione and her Muggle-Born status… still, though, there had been a part of him which had been wishing they were wrong. Such small hope had been crushed in the dead of the night in the Hospital Wing. 

The Chamber of Secrets was more than a myth, more than a legend and more than an exaggeration of Salazar Slytherin’s reputation. The Chamber, the horror within — they were all real. Despite all the inspections, despite the likes of Headmaster Dumbledore having searched for it, there was a monster roaming the shadows of the castle, its lair hidden somewhere no one knew existed. 

Harry had never felt fear such as this, not even the year before when he had faced Voldemort’s spirit. 

He had been feeling the pain of having thirty-three bones of his arm regrowing when Dobby had landed on his face, his squeaky voice waking Harry up from his induced slumber. The House-Elf has stayed away for so long that Harry had begun to think he had imagined the tiny creature. 

Again, that night had proven him wrong. 

He had thought it impossible for a human being to be able to feel so many emotions at once. He had thought feelings surfaced one at a time, that his only options were to like or dislike someone. But as Dobby jumped on his head, his tennis ball-like eyes wet and his hands raw from being ironed, Harry had felt pity. He had felt sorry for the small creature who had to endure a life of suffering under the thumb of his master. 

And then the small elf admitted to having been responsible for Ron and Harry having been locked out of the passage at the train station and missing the Hogwarts Expressatn the beginning of the year. Dobby had been responsible for Snape stripping Gryffindor of so many points that their House had only recently managed to recuperate — Percy Weasley having happily told Harry that he had been granted fifty points after catching the Snitch on Saturday, leaving them leading the House Cup after Nott lost thirty for putting permanent green and silver paint in the showers of Gryffindor Tower. Dobby had been the one who jinxed the Bludger which almost blew Harry’s head in the middle of the match, claiming that Harry would be safer if he was sent home for being severely injured. 

Harry had felt uncontrollable anger, then, only his missing bones stopping him from strangling Dobby to death right there. Harry could have died; any of the players could have died because of the elf. Harry and Ron could have been expelled because of him. 

All because Dobby had gone after Harry in an attempt to protect him — against what his master wanted. 

Harry’s rage had faded considerably when the House-Elf spoke about his master. An awful wizard who treated the small creature as a vermin, as a lesser. The same way all House-Elves had been treated when Voldemort was still powerful, and his ideals were ruling openly. Harry had asked Dobby, but the elf had seemed physically incapable to talk details about his master; to tell Harry how come the little creature could know about the opening of the Chamber of Secrets. 

Harry was sure Dobby’s master was a dark follower. He was sure Dobby’s master must be somehow connected to the releasing of the horror within the Chamber, the same horror which had petrified Mrs. Norris and wrote a message in blood where eleven-year-old students could see. 

And it sent a chill up Harry’s spine to hear that, more so than the Muggle-Borns the heir had claimed to be after, Dobby had said Harry was in danger the most. 

He had wanted to ask more, wanted to use Dobby’s strong admiration of him to extract more answers. Dobby had expressed how grateful he was that Harry defeated Voldemort all those years ago. Like so many others, the small elf worshipped the innocent baby who unknowably stopped the darkest wizard of all times. Harry felt important just as much as he felt undeserving of such blind veneration. 

But before he could, Dumbledore and McGonagall had barged in, Colin Creevey’s petrified body in between them. Harry’s stomach had sunk when the Transfiguration Professor suggested the first-year boy had been sneaking in to come to see him when the monster attacked him, melting the filter of his camera. Colin had been the first victim — the first Muggle-Born who was lucky to still be alive after falling in the monster’s claws, even if barely so. 

Harry’s suspicion of Nott had solidified, then, as he remembered the first conversation he’d had with Colin. The boy had recalled the number of pranks Nott had played on him — not all of them as innocent as stealing his homework. Colin had said how much Nott had admitted to finding him annoying. By unleashing the monster on him, Nott would be both testing his control as the heir and getting rid of the boy who babbled the blood out of his ears. 

And then headmaster Dumbledore had whispered in the night, unaware that ears other than McGonagall’s and Madam Pomfrey’s were listening, that the Chamber of Secrets has been opened again. He had known the Chamber was real all along; the Headmaster had known that the threat was real and that, eventually, a descendant of Salazar Slytherin could come back and fulfil his legacy, but he had done nothing to avoid it. 

He had done nothing to stop the likes of Malfoy and Nott from roaming the castle. 

Harry had wondered, then, if maybe Nott knew how to open the Chamber because his mother gave him the steps, and told him where to look. Told him how — such information a mystery to Dumbledore himself. 

Harry wondered if maybe Ravenna Yaxley had been the one to open the Chamber when she was a student. If maybe she had set the monster loose in the middle of Muggle London, hopeful that it would rid the world of as many Muggles as it could manage before the Ministry caught her.  

Ron and Hermione had come to a similar conclusion when he told them about it in Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom, where Hermione had decided was the safest place to brew the Polyjuice Potion they needed.

It had taken mere hours for the gossip to spread and the news that Colin Creevey had been petrified by the hands of the heir to reach the entirety of the student body, and Harry noticed that the suspicious glances thrown his way had increased. First years were now walking in small, hurtled groups close together, and more than once those had run in fright at the sight of Harry. 

It was astonishing how fast people’s opinions changed. Harry hated how much it bothered him, but it did. He went from hero to villain in the blink of an eye, all because he had happened to be standing in the wrong place at the wrong time. It irked him how no one seemed to connect the dots as he had; how no one found Nott and Malfoy suspicious as the two of them strutted the corridors of the castle, the only ones who seemed to be utterly unaffected by the dreading mood reigning inside Hogwarts. 

Harry had greeted his teeth in frustration and — surprise, surprise — more anger when he found out from Neville that Nott and Malfoy had been trading fake talismans, amulets and other supposedly protective devices to the other students. Neville had bought one himself. Nott had promised it would detect whenever the monster was near and flash red so he would have time to run. Neville only found he had been lied to when his necklace started ticking and, seconds later, it transformed itself into a clock. 

Nott had used Transfiguration to trick him. 

Their dorm mate had avoided both Ron and Harry since the incident happened, and Ron lost his cool as he berated Neville for coming remotely close to a snake, Nott especially. Even now, weeks later, Neville still looked at the floor as he passed the trio at the entrance of the Great Hall before breakfast, where Harry, Ron and Hermione were writing their names down on the list McGonagall collected the names of all the students who would remain at Hogwarts during the two weeks of Christmas Break. 

“Oh, no!” Hermione gasped in horror, her hand covering her mouth as she skimmed the list after writing down her name. “Oh, dear… Harry, look! Only Malfoy is staying here for Christmas. Nott is going home!” 

“I told you we shouldn’t do this during Christmas.” Ron said to the side, a satisfactory look on his face. 

Harry face-palmed. He had silently agreed with Ron when they had that conversation, but he hadn’t wanted to anger Hermione any further after she had yet another spat with Myrtle over if Hermione had insulted the sensitive ghost or not. 

Hermione had insisted that they needed to act as fast as possible; they had to get a confession out of either Nott or Malfoy before they could attack any more unaware Muggle-Borns, and there was no better time to do it than when the school was mostly empty — the Slytherin Common Room included. 

“Shut it, Ronald. Christmas is our best shot and you know it.” Hermione said nervously. “Okay, okay… I’ve got it, I’ve got it… we will have to do it the day before Nott goes home. It will give me enough time to brew the Polyjuice Potion — that is if can get the other ingredients.”

“Hermione,” Harry said carefully, “we have a better chance of sneaking the bicorn horn and the boomslang skin past the Chamber’s monster than Snape. I know we need it, but there must be another way to get it in time.”

“What we need,” Hermione said briskly, “is a diversion. Then one of us can sneak into Snape’s office and take the ingredients we need. We have a lesson today. We must do it!” 

Harry and Ron looked at her nervously, Harry going as far as to double-check the list glued to the stone wall in search of Nott’s name, but he knew it would be fruitless. He didn’t know why they had even considered that Nott would stay, to begin with. He was clearly a mommy’s little boy. There was no way the same witch who hadn’t allowed Nott down from her arms for years would let him spend Christmas away from her. 

“I think I’d better do the actual stealing.” Hermione continued in a matter-of-fact tone which worried Harry slightly. “You two will certainly be expelled if you get into any more trouble, and I’ve got a clean record. Besides, I don’t trust you two to know what the ingredients look like. So all you need to do is cause enough mayhem to keep Snape busy for five minutes or so.”

“As if mayhem in his class wouldn’t make Snape expel us.” Ron mumbled under his breath, and Harry nodded stiffly. 

Breathing in Snape’s class was already dangerous enough, deliberately causing a mess would be as safe as walking the castle’s corridors drenched in Muggle blood to attract the monster. 

They were about to enter the Great Hall to have their breakfast before lessons started when Percy appeared walking their way, an air of importance to him as he looked at the wandering students through the gap between his lenses and cheek. Ron groaned as his brother grinned upon seeing them. 

“Harry, Ron, Hermione, good thing I’ve encountered you three.” He said, opening a parchment he had rolled under his arm. “Professor McGonagall has trusted me with divulging the start of Hogwarts's own duelling club. I reckon it was an initiative to abate the fear among the students — all very smart if you ask me. I advise you to subscribe, especially you, Ron. No doubt it would look impressive on your resume if you manage to stand out.”

“Merlin, Percy, don’t you have anywhere else to be?” Ron hissed, shooing his older brother away, much to Hermione’s annoyance. 

Percy glared as he magically glued the parchment on the wall, beside the list they had just signed. 

“Indeed I have.” He answered standoffishly. “Ginny hasn’t been herself since the Creevey boy was attacked and the twins have frightened her more with their pranks. I’ve promised to eat with her and walk her to classes so she will feel safe.”

“Yeah, you do that.” Ron snapped, grimacing at Percy’s back as he went away. “He’s been extra unbearable lately. Fred said he has been writing our every move to mom, the slimy git.”

“I think Percy’s right. — I mean about the duelling club.” Hermione clarified when Ron glared angrily at her. “It would be a nice opportunity to learn more spells and how to use them outside of classroom practice routine. And I’ve heard that Professor Flitwick was a duelling champion. I bet he is the Professor in charge.” 

“I guess it won’t hurt to check it out.” Harry commented, excitement bubbling inside him as he thought about learning how to duel another wizard. 

He just hoped it wouldn’t be another one of Lockhart’s attempts to increase his popularity by talking about himself to a room full of impressionable students.

“Fine.” Ron grunted. “Don’t any of you dare tell Percy. He won’t stop gloating.”

Harry laughed as he entered the Great Hall, their plans for that afternoon momentarily forgotten. 

Potions lessons took place in one of the large dungeons. Their afternoon lesson proceeded in the usual way. Twenty cauldrons stood steaming between the wooden desks, on which stood brass scales and jars of ingredients. Snape prowled through the fumes, making waspish remarks about the Gryffindoors’ work while the Slytherins sniggered appreciatively.

It had come as a surprise to Harry to discover that, as much as Nott seemed to be a prodigy in everything else, potions were not his strongest suit. From what he noticed, Nott seemed unable to keep still. The Slytherin was always doing… something, be it scribbling notes on the edges of books which were not related to potions, drawing doddles that he would then show to Malfoy and they would giggle together, tilting his stool back to see how long he could keep his balance when leaning in just two of the stool legs. His potions were never a disaster like Harry’s, but Snape always found something that Nott could have done better. 

That had also come as a surprise to Harry. 

Malfoy was Snape’s favourite student. He could get away with anything when Snape was the referee. Harry had thought Nott would be the same, but he couldn’t have been wronger. Snape treated him better than he did the Gryffindors, but it was still way worse than how he did the Slytherins. 

Harry had no clue if he should be happy or annoyed by that. 

Harry’s Swelling Solution was far too runny, but he had his eye on more important things. He was waiting for the signal Hermione had said she would give him, and he hardly listened as Snape paused to sneer at his watery potion. When Snape turned and walked off to bully a trembling Neville, Hermione caught Harry’s eyes and nodded. 

Harry never noticed the pair of silver eyes following the action. 

Harry ducked swiftly down behind his cauldron, pulled one of Fred’s Filibuster fireworks out of his pocket, and gave it a quick prod with his wand. The firework began to fizz and sputter. Knowing he had only seconds, Harry straightened up, took aim, and lobbed it into the air; it landed right on the target — Malfoy’s unprotected cauldron as he was too busy adding something to Nott’s potion. 

Malfoy’s potion exploded, showering the whole class in goo. People shrieked as splashes of the Swelling Solution hit them. Malfoy had dodged most of the splash, but some of it had gotten on the side of his face, making his left ear swell like a balloon. Unfortunately, Harry noticed that Nott’s stool fell back off its two legs at the noise, sparing him from being hit by the Swelling Solution. Snape was there in a minute while simultaneously trying to restore calm and find out what happened. Through the confusion, Harry saw Hermione quietly — and more importantly, unnoticeably — slip into Snape’s office. 

“Silence! SILENCE!” Snape roared. “Anyone who has been splashed, come here for a Deflating Draft — when I find out who did this —”

Harry laughed as half the class lumbered up to Snape’s desk, some weighting down with arms like clubs, others unable to talk through gigantic puffed-up lips. Crabbe and Goyle had both been splashed. Goyle’s nose was the size of a melon, his head dropping and his body being pushed forward by the weight of it. 

Harry gulped mid-laugh, though, as Snape’s words finally made sense to him. 

Snape didn’t believe it had been Malfoy’s mistake. He already knew it had been someone else sabotaging the blond’s work. And, with Harry’s luck, he would be the first suspect on Snape’s list. 

He didn’t even feel the sense of victory displayed on Ron’s face when Hermione slid back into the dungeon, with the front of her robes bulging with the ingredients she had stolen.

When everyone had taken a swig of antidote and the various swelling had subsided, Snape swept over to Malfoy’s cauldron and fished the contents from inside. He said nothing, but his black eyes rounded on Harry immediately and remained watching him until the bell rang indicating the end of the lesson. 

Harry and Ron were the first ones out of the door as the lesson came to an end, and they round the first alcove they found to wait for Hermione. They soon heard footsteps and smiled at each other. 

Harry’s smile wavered as Nott appeared, smirking wickedly as he held the twisted remains of the firework in his hands. 

“Yours, isn’t it?” He said and threw the squishy, swollen thing at Harry’s feet. 

“You don’t know that, Nott.” Ron tried, but his light blue eyes were wide, his voice shaky as he tried and failed to seem intimidating. 

Nott simply arched an unimpressed eyebrow at him. 

“Draco’s never missed a potion.” Nott commented. “And he wouldn’t start with something as stupidly simple as the Swelling Solution.”

“There is a first time for everything.” Harry said bravely, but Nott’s smirk only widened. 

“Your innocent faces are just as bad as Granger’s hair, d’you know that?” He drawled lazily. “I’ll enjoy the day Snape discovers the missing ingredient from his privet cabinet. He is a smart lad, I’m sure he’ll figure out who stole from him in no time.”

“What are you playing at, Nott?” Harry asked suspiciously. “Why did you take the firework? Why are you not ratting us out to Snape right now?”

“Why, Potter, I like to have fun.” Nott explained calmly, tautly. “Imagine how much madder Snape will become with each day that passes with him not knowing who did it. I reckon his rage will increase hand in hand with the length of time he has been made a fool of. And it will be so much more fun for me to watch him catch you dumb Gryffindoors then.”

“You —” Ron started, but Nott’s drawl interrupted him again. 

“And I find it… satisfying to know that you’ll enter the dungeons trembling in anticipation until that happens.”

With that, Nott turned his back to them and stalked in the direction of the Slytherin Common Room as if he owned it — like he owned the castle. Much like Harry believed the heir would behave. He stared with loathing at Nott’s retreating back; at his dark hair tied in a knot at his nape, the undone tie around his neck, his untucked shirt and nearly empty school bag. 

“Blimey, Hermione’s right.” Ron whispered, his eyes following Harry’s. “Nott is trying to kill us all.”

“Hopefully, Snape will expel us before he can try.” Harry said, just as Hermione came closer and motioned for them to follow her — towards Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom. 

Harry and Ron reached a silent agreement not to say anything to Hermione about their — rather terrifying — encounter with Nott. They stood to the side as she went to the small stall where they were using the toilet as a cauldron to brew the Polyjuice Potion. Myrtle was thankfully not there that day, probably having found another place to cry her misery. 

Harry distantly wondered if the ghost could maybe rat them out, and what they would do if anyone actually believe a word that came out of her mouth. 

He decided not to jinx his luck by even thinking about it. 

“It’ll be ready in time!” Hermione told them happily as she came to them. 

Harry could barely keep his eyes open as he followed Ron and Hermione through the castle grounds towards the greenhouses where they would be having Herbology lessons — thankfully the last lesson of the day. Astronomy class took place at eleven the day before for the Gryffindors and, while Ron fell asleep five minutes into Professor Sinistra’s lecture about the planets’ positions and their influence in fortune telling, Harry had stayed awake, hearing and not understanding a single word the professor was saying. He dozed off as soon as his head hit the pillow at three in the morning. And he had to wake up at seven sharp to go to breakfast before Charms. 

He was exhausted. His eyelids were heavy and begging him to close them. He was so extremely envious of the Slytherins enjoying their free period before dinner. 

“I think we should go again.” Hermione was saying, still set on attending the duelling club. Harry bet all the gold he had on Gringotts that she was the only one. “The last encounter might not have gone… as expected, but we did learn something.”

“Yeah” Ron snorted, “that Lockhart can’t tell a wand from a wooden stick. There is no defending him anymore, Hermione.”

“Well —” Hermione struggled to find words, “it’s not like Professor Snape was being fair. He wouldn’t let Professor Lockhart teach us anything.”

“Hermione, I never thought I would say this, but Snape was the only good part of that bloody night.”

“He could have seriously hurt Professor Lockhart, Ronald!”

“Pity he didn’t.” Ron deadpanned and Harry chuckled under his breath, remembering the scene. 

They had arrived together with a sea of students from all years. Like Hermione, the majority of them had thought it would be their Charms teacher, professor Flitwick, who would be instructing them. Instead, there was a common groan echoing through the Great Hall as the doors opened to reveal the four House tables vanished and a golden stage standing proud along the far wall, lit by a thousand candles floating overhead, with a pompous Lockhart grinning over-excitedly at them atop it. 

Harry had wished he had been as fast as Nott and Malfoy and left as soon as he entered, but he hadn’t. Instead, he had been dragged by Hermione to the front roll, the closest to Lockhart they would go. 

Harry hadn’t known whether he should laugh or cry when he saw an irritated-looking Snape coming out of the shadows. He had thought Lockhart should’ve been crying when a sinister grin twisted Snape’s usual sneer as he positioned himself for the demonstration — and proceeded to bombard Lockhart against the wall with the first disarming charm he fired. 

Lockhart hadn’t managed to successfully do one spell the whole night. And he hadn’t managed to teach them a single thing. By the time they had been allowed to leave, Lockhart had been the most dishevelled Harry has ever seen him, his flashy robes torn in multiple places and his smile faltering. 

Hermione has been struggling to defend him, calling it performance anxiety when someone brought up his incompetence. She was still set on her ways, believing every single word Lockhart wrote in his books, believing him talented for having been hired by Dumbledore. 

“You reckon Professor Sprout would mind us ditching Herbology?” Ron asked Harry quietly. “I’m not in the mood to be covered in pesticide again.” 

“I don’t think Professor Sprout is whom we should be worried about.” Harry answered tiredly, nodding at the glare Hermione shot at them over her shoulder. 

“This is so unfair!” Ron complained. “Look at them!” He pointed at the laying forms of Nott, Malfoy, Zabini and Pansy Parkinson under the shadows of a tree near the Black Lake. Nott was dangling his wand on his fingers, a ball of fire floating in front of him, no doubt serving as the group’s source of warmth. “Why do we have lessons when the likes of Nott and Malfoy can just laze around like the bunch of spoiled gits they are?” 

“Just ignore them, Ronald.” Hermione said flippantly. “They’re just being childish. No doubt they’re here just to gloat.”

“Well — it’s working.” Ron mumbled as they passed by the sitting group. 

Harry snickered as he noticed Parkinson batting her eyelashes at Malfoy, complaining shrilly about the cold as she slid closer and closer to the blond, who seemed pained to have her near him. Harry felt a flicker of gratitude for Parkinson, hoping she would feed her infatuation and continue to render Malfoy as constipated as he looked. 

Harry was too busy basking on Malfoy’s misery to notice Nott’s fire had been extinguished, and the other boy was now pointing his wand to the place in front of Harry, a smirk on his face. 

“Serpensortia!” He said clearly and the end of his wand exploded. Harry watched, aghast, as a long black snake shot out of it, falling heavily onto the floor right in front of Hermione, who shrieked in fright and backed away, grabbing Harry’s arm. The Slytherin doubled over in laughter as Parkinson mimicked Hermione.

Harry stood motionless, inhumanly still as the snake stared directly into his eyes. Around him, he could hear Ron whimpering and the few Hufflepuffs who were following the same path to the Greenhouse as they had been screamed, agitating the snake further. 

“Mr. Nott!” The yell came from the distance, where plump Professor Sprout was coming towards them, her hands holding her yellow skirts almost to her knees as she rushed her step. “You better vanish that snake before I do, young man, or I’ll deduct points!”

Harry has always thought her stupidly kind. 

“Relax, professor!” Nott responded just as loud, reclining back against the trunk of the tree, unbothered by the frightened students divided between glaring at him and looking intently at the snake, ready to bolt if it came any closer. “It doesn’t have any poison. Worst case scenario someone will get a new scar and Potter won’t be so special anymore!”

“That’s it!” Professor Sprout screamed. “Twenty points from Slytherin! Vanish this snake this instant, Mr. Nott!”

“Alright, alright…” Nott drawled, deliberately dropping his wand and taking forever to pick it back up. 

Nott was crazy. He was a murderous, crazy git. 

The snake was hissing furiously as it slithered straight toward Justin Finch-Fletchley and rose the front of its body from the ground, fangs exposed and poised to strike. Harry wasn’t sure what exactly made him do it. He wasn’t even aware of deciding to do it at all. All he knew was that his legs were carrying him forward as though he was in trance, as if he was on casters and that he has shouted stupidly at the snake, “Leave him alone!” 

Miraculously — inexplicably — the snake slumped to the floor, docile as a thick, black garden hose, its eyes now on Harry. Harry felt the fear completely drain out — irrationally drain out of him, as there was a part of his brain still lit in fright, telling him to run as fast as he could. He somehow knew the snake wouldn’t attack anyone now with the same illogical certainty he has been telling others his name since he learned what it was from his relatives. 

He looked up grinning in victory, expecting to see the dumbstruck look on Nott’s face once his prank so beautifully failed, expecting to see Professor Sprout staring at him proudly, ready to grant him the points she had deducted from Nott; wanting to find Justin Finch-Fletchley — a boy who hasn’t looked him in the eye since their found Mrs. Norris — looking relieved to have been saved, perhaps even puzzled or grateful. 

He was not expecting to find the Hufflepuff angry and scared, and Nott with his expression serious for the first time since Harry has known him, both his eyebrows arched in surprise.

“Well—” Nott drawled, gaze calculating as he glanced at Malfoy, “that’s certainly knew.” With a flick of his wand, the snake vanished. 

“What do you think you’re playing at?” Justin shouted at Harry and stormed off with quick steps, to the open arms of his Head of House, who was staring at Harry almost in accusation. 

The students all around them started muttering furiously. 

“Come on,” Ron said close to his ear, steering Harry away, “Move — come on —”

Ron was taking him back to the castle, Hermione hurrying alongside them. As they went through the front doors, the people on either side drew away as they passed, as if frightened of catching a contagious disease. Harry didn’t have a single clue what was going on, and neither Ron nor Hermione explained anything to him until they dragged him all the way up to the thankfully empty Gryffindor Common Room. 

“You’re a Perselmouth!” Ron exclaimed. “Why didn’t you tell us?”

“I’m what?” Harry asked, brows furrowed. 

“A Perselmouth!” Ron repeated. “You can talk to snakes!”

“I know.” Harry said dumbly, thinking it obvious. “I mean, that’s only the second time I’ve ever done it. I accidentally set a boa constrictor on my cousin Dudley at the zoo once — long story — but it was telling me it had never seen Brazil and I sort of set it free without meaning to — but that was before I even knew I was a wizard —”

“A boa constrictor told you it had never seen Brazil?” Ron repeated faintly. 

“So?” Harry asked. “I bet loads of people here can do it.”

“Oh, no, they can’t.” Ron said slowly, as if Harry was a stupid child he was made to explain the sky was blue. “It’s not a very common… gift — if you can even call it that. Harry, this is bad.”

“What’s bad?” Harry snapped, starting to feel angry at the circles Ron was talking. “What’s wrong with everyone? Listen, if I hadn’t told that snake not to attack Justin, it would have bitten him before Professor Sprout got there! And Nott sure as hell wouldn’t have vanished it until someone was seriously hurt!”

“That’s what you said to it?” Ron asked, looking relieved. 

“What d’you mean, Ron? You were there! You heard me!”

“I only heard you speaking Parseltongue, Harry.” Ron said. “Snake language. You could have been saying anything — no wonder Justin panicked, you sounded like you’re egging the snake on or something — it was creepy, Harry —”

Harry could only gape at him. “I spoke a different language? But — I didn’t realise — how can I speak a language without knowing I can even speak it?”

Ron shook his head. Both he and Hermione were looking at him like the bunch of people outside — as if someone had died right in front of them. Harry couldn’t see what was so terrible. 

“Do you want to tell me what’s so wrong with stopping a massive snake from biting off Justin’s head?” He asked snappily. “What does it matter how I did it as long as Justin doesn’t have to join Nick’s club of the nearly headless?”

“It matters,” Hermione said, speaking at last in a hushed tone, as if fearful, “because being able to talk to snakes was what Salazar Slytherin was famous for, Harry. It’s all in Hogwarts: a story — it makes sense the whole school seems to know it. Him being a Perselmouth is why the symbol of Slytherin House is a serpent.”

Harry’s mouth fell open at the implication. 

“Exactly.” Ron said breathlessly. “And now the whole school’s going to think you’re his great-great-great-great-great-grandson or something —”

“But I’m not!” Harry said, feeling such panic he couldn’t explain. “Nott — Nott is! Hermione, you said so yourself! Nott is the heir of Slytherin! We just have to find proof!”

“I know what I said.” Hermione snapped. “And I stand by it, but… Harry, Salazar Slytherin lived about a thousand years ago. For all we know, you could be a descendant just as much as Nott. Maybe that’s why he conjured the snake in the first place.” Hermione added pensively. “He would be taking the focus off himself by proving your connection to Slytherin.”

Harry toned her out, slumping on the armchair in the Common Room. He would have to disappear before the room overflowed with people — judging people. People who thought he had ordered the snake to attack Justin Finch-Fletchley; who heard him speaking a language all but him could recognise, but no one but him could understand — a language only Salazar Slytherin and those from his line have been recorded to speak. 

Harry observed the snow falling outside, the small flakes obscuring the long windows of the tower. He envied those. They had only to follow the wind, their only concern was the sun; but, even when they melted, they continued to flow as water. They were a part of a closed cycle — their path already set. There was no room for surprises, no room for doubts, and no room for uncertainties. 

So different from Harry. 

He laid awake even after taking the stairs to his dorm, having gone there after Ron’s sister passed through the door with a hunted look on her face, her eyes swelling in tears as soon as she focused on Harry. 

The Sorting Hat’s words kept replaying in his mind, his whispers about how great Slytherin could have made him. The reluctance of the hat to put him in Gryffindor until Harry begged it. He wondered if he deserved to be covering himself with the red and gold blanket; if he deserved to play as the lion’s Seeker, when he could be the heir — one of the heirs — of Slytherin. 

His relatives had never told him anything about his family. The only thing he knew about his father was his name and nothing more. Maybe he was indeed a descendent from Salazar, even if he wasn’t the one attacking the Muggle-Borns. 

He only wished the school wouldn’t be so thick so as to not see it. 

Harry had been right. The school was filled with thick people. 

Wherever he went, he was glared at. Wherever he went the students erupted in whispers, fingers pointing and expressions frightened. First-years ran away from him. Older students gripped their wands. Even his fellows Gryffindors were wary around him, tiptoeing when he was near, muffling conversations when he came closer, smiling stiffly, painfully when their gazes met. 

Harry had heard the talks. 

People were finding patterns where there were none — not seeing the patterns which were actually there for them to find. Somehow, everybody now knew of Harry’s encounter with Filch after the Quidditch training, having discovered that Harry had known Filch was a Squib before the attack on Madam Norris — however untrue that was. People were recalling Harry’s annoyance at having Collin Creevey following him around, and asking for autographs — they were saying those had been the reasons why Harry had chosen the boy to be his next victim. 

And Ernie Macmillan from Hufflepuff has been telling who wanted to hear that Justin Finch-Fletchley had barricaded himself in their Common Room, terrified of the target he believed to be on his back after he told Harry he was a Muggle-Born at the beginning of the year. 

Speculations were running wild about what happened on that tragic Halloween night in 1980. Instead of Harry being held as the hero who vanished the darkest wizard of all time, he was seen as the one who could have threatened Voldemort’s dark reign of power. 

Harry had found out that speaking the language of snakes was the mark of a Dark Wizard. 

He had thought he would find some sympathy in his two best friends, but all Hermione could talk about was the potion, they were close to finishing and Nott — how she was sure the boy was the one behind every single thing that had gone wrong that year. Harry had sincerely started to think so, too, no more believing it to be Hermione’s insecurity finding excuses for her fears. But he couldn’t stand talking about it anymore. 

And Ron has been eyeing Harry enviously since discovering his newfound abilities. Harry just wanted to scream at him — scream that being a Perselmouth was not a talent, it was not a gift. It was the curse that was causing Harry to be shunned. His temper has been flaring each time Harry heard his surname being whispered as a swear word. 

He had thought he could find Justin and apologise to him, explain exactly what had happened and even disclose all they knew about Nott. If the school saw Justin waking in the hallways again, completely unafraid as he talked to Harry, he thought that maybe all would go back to normal. But he has been looking for more than fifteen minutes, and there was no sight of the Hufflepuff around the castle. 

Harry was rounding the corner outside the library when he saw Hagrid’s large back covered in his moleskin overcoat standing still in the middle of the corridor. As Harry approached him, he heard voices. 

“We didn’t kill it if that’s what you’re trying to insinuate.” Malfoy was saying, the brim of his pants soaked and his robes covered in snow. He had been outside, then, as had Nott. 

Theo Nott was standing next to him, his clothing in the same state and his cheeks with two red spots on them due to the cold. In his hands, Nott had a dead rooster, its feathers dirtying the floor and trailing a path down the stairs. That must have been from where the two Slytherin had come from — or where they were going before being ambushed by Hagrid. 

“‘ow come yeh two ‘ave it then?” Hagrid grunted at the two boys. “This’s the second one killed this term.”

“Shocker considering you’re the one looking after them.” Nott drawled sarcastically, rolling his eyes when Malfoy bumped their shoulders. 

“Not now, Theo!” The blond hissed. “We found the bird already dead, you oaf.”

“Why’d yeh take it?” Hagrid inquired what Harry was thinking. 

“We don’t have to answer to you, do we?” Malfoy spat nastily, eyeing Hagrid up and down, scrunching his pointy nose in distaste. 

“Gimme’ the rooster, Malfoy. I’ve to take it to ‘umbledore.” Hagrid demanded. 

“Why?” Nott asked. “Is that old loony planning on having a funeral for all the birds that die on school grounds?” 

“Don’t you ‘are disrespect Albus ‘umbledore in front of me, Nott!” Hagrid bellowed, his hands clenching into fists, and Harry silently urged his friend to punch Nott square in the face. “This is the secon’ rooster kille’ this te’m. It’s eithe’ foxes or a Blood-Suckin Bugbear, an’ I need the Hea’master’s permission ter put a charm aroun’ the hen coop.” 

“As if you can do any decent charms.” Nott snorted, dropping the dead rooster at Hagrid’s feet and storming off, Malfoy close on his heels with a pensive look on his face. 

Harry got out of there before Hagrid could notice him — and possibly ask him to examine the dead bird with him. 

Harry stamped up the stairs and turned along another corridor, which was particularly dark; the torches had been extinguished by a strong, icy draft that was blowing through a loose windowpane. He was thinking about the pensive look on Malfoy’s angular face as he stared at the rooster. The blond had seemed… almost nervous. 

But Harry couldn’t understand what they would want with a dead bird; why none of the Slytherins had appeared the least bit surprised at hearing that roosters have been being killed. Maybe Malfoy had been lying, though, and he and Nott had, indeed, been murdering chickens as their idea of fun. Maybe Nott would have planted its corpse in the Gryffindor Common Room to terrify the lions even more — Harry could see Nott enjoying the twisted irony of it, spreading fear in the dent of bravery. 

He was halfway down the passage when he tripped headlong over something lying on the floor. 

Harry turned to squint at what he had fallen over and felt as though his stomach had dissolved inside his body, the contents rushing to his throat as bile. 

Justin Finch-Fletchley was lying on the floor, rigid and cold, a look of shock frozen on his face, his eyes staring blankly at the ceiling. And that wasn’t all. Next to the petrified Hufflepuff was another figure, the strangest, most chilling sight Harry has ever seen. 

Nearly Headless Nick, no longer pearly-white and transparent, was floating immobile and horizontal six inches off the floor, his form completely black and smoky. His head was half off and his own facial expression was mirroring Justin’s. 

Harry got to his feet as fast as he could, his breathing fast and shallow, his heart thundering painfully against his ribcage. He looked widely up and down the thankfully deserted corridor, noticing absently the line of spiders scuttling as fast as they could go from the bodies. The only sounds were the muffled voices of teachers from the classes on either side. 

He could run. Harry could run back to Gryffindor Tower, pretend he had never even left. He could go now and no one would ever know he had been there at all. Hagrid hadn’t seen him — nor had Malfoy and Nott. There was no one to contradict his version of events. But… but he couldn’t just leave Justin and Nick to root there. He had to call for help. 

Harry was panicking as his mind screaming at him to go, that not a single person would believe him if he claimed to have once again been in the wrong place at the wrong time; but his legs wouldn’t obey the command, as if they too had been petrified and locked to the floor. 

He was still deciding what to do when Peeves came shooting out through the wall. 

It took the poltergeist two seconds to make sense of what he was seeing, “ATTACK! ATTACK! ANOTHER ATTACK! NO MORTAL OR GHOST IS SAFE! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES! ATTTAAAAACK!”

Harry felt like he was seeing the scene from outside his body as door after door crashed against the walls as they were opened and people flooded out of the classrooms and saw him standing there, above Justin’s petrified body. 

Chapter Text

Previous Chapter: 

Harry turned to squint at what he had fallen over and felt as though his stomach had dissolved inside his body, the contents rushing to his throat as bile. 

Justin Finch-Fletchley was lying on the floor, rigid and cold, a look of shock frozen on his face, his eyes staring blankly at the ceiling. And that wasn’t all. Next to the petrified Hufflepuff was another figure, the strangest, most chilling sight Harry has ever seen. 

Nearly Headless Nick, no longer pearly-white and transparent, was floating immobile and horizontal six inches off the floor, his form completely black and smoky. His head was half off and his own facial expression was mirroring Justin’s. 

Harry got to his feet as fast as he could, his breathing fast and shallow, his heart thundering painfully against his ribcage. He looked widely up and down the thankfully deserted corridor, noticing absently the line of spiders scuttling as fast as they could go from the bodies. The only sounds were the muffled voices of teachers from the classes on either side. 

He could run. Harry could run back to Gryffindor Tower, pretend he had never even left. He could go now and no one would ever know he had been there at all. Hagrid hadn’t seen him — nor had Malfoy and Nott. There was no one to contradict his version of events. But… but he couldn’t just leave Justin and Nick to root there. He had to call for help. 

Harry was panicking as his mind screaming at him to go, that not a single person would believe him if he claimed to have once again been in the wrong place at the wrong time; but his legs wouldn’t obey the command, as if they too had been petrified and locked to the floor. 

He was still deciding what to do when Peeves came shooting out through the wall. 

It took the poltergeist two seconds to make sense of what he was seeing, “ATTACK! ATTACK! ANOTHER ATTACK! NO MORTAL OR GHOST IS SAFE! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES! ATTTAAAAACK!”

Harry felt like he was seeing the scene from outside his body as door after door crashed against the walls as they were opened and people flooded out of the classrooms and saw him standing there, above Justin’s petrified body.

For several minutes, there was a scene of such confusion that Justin was in danger of being squashed. 

Harry found himself pinned against the wall as the teachers shouted for quiet, many gasping as they took in what was in front of them. Professor McGonagall was the first one to come running, followed by her own class. 

She used her wand to set off a loud bang which restored the silence, and ordered everyone back into their classrooms. Peeves continued bobbing overhead, grinning wickedly at the chaos he had helped issue. Harry frowned at that, finding the way the poltergeist’s expression reminded him of Nott extremely off-putting. 

“Oh, Potter, you rotter, oh, what have you done, you’re killing off students, you think it’s good fun —” the poltergeist sung at the top of his lungs. 

“That’s enough, Peeves!” Professor McGonagall barked, succeeding in sending Peeves away. 

Justin was carried up to the Hospital Wing by Professor Flitwick and Professor Sinistra but nobody seemed to know what to do for Nearly Headless Nick. In the end, Professor McGonagall conjured a large fan out of thin air, which she gave to Ernie Macmillan — who had appeared to see the commotion — with instructions to waft Nick up the stairs. Ernie did, fanning Nick along like a silent black hovercraft. 

This left Harry and Professor McGonagall alone together, and Harry gulped at the stern sight of his Head of House. 

“Professor,” Harry said desperately, “I swear I didn’t —”

“This is out of my hands, Mr. Potter.” The Transfiguration Professor answered curtly, her lips crisped in disapproval. More serious than the looks she had reserved for Nott. 

They marched in silence around the corner and she stopped before a large and extremely ugly stone gargoyle. 

“Lemon drop!” She said — the word evidently a password, because the gargoyle sprang suddenly to life and hopped aside as the wall behind it split in two. 

Even full of dread for what was coming, Harry couldn’t help but feel amazed. Behind the wall was a spiral staircase which was moving smoothly upward, like an escalator at Muggle malls. 

Harry tentatively followed Professor McGonagall as she stepped onto it, and he startled as he heard the thud of the wall closing back behind him. They rose upward in circles, higher and higher, until at least, slightly dizzy after climbing so many steps in circles, Harry saw a gleaming oak door ahead with a brass knocker in the shape of a griffin. 

His eyes widened as realisation dawned on him that he was being taken to the headmaster’s office — entering where Dumbledore most probably lived in the castle. 

Harry searched for professor McGonagall with his eyes, the witch his only source of security in a territory he was terrified to explore on his own, but she simply pushed open the door after knocking faintly and told Harry to wait inside before turning her back and leaving him.

He was completely alone in Dumbledore’s office with the weight of countless accusations and two more petrified bodies making him sweat with misplaced guilt for something he hadn’t done. 

Harry looked around apprehensively, afraid his breathing would disturb the magical aura of the place. One thing was certain, though: of all the teacher’s offices Harry had visited so far this year, Dumbledore’s was by far the most interesting. If he hadn’t been scared out of his wits that he was about to be thrown out of school, he would have found more pleasure at being there. 

It was a large and beautiful circular room, full of funny little noises. A number of curious silver instruments stood on spindle legged portraits of old headmasters and headmistresses, all of whom were snoozing gently in their frames. There was also an enormous, claw-footed desk, and, sitting on a shelf behind it, a shabby, tattered wizard’s hat — the Sorting Hat. 

Harry hesitated as his legs trembled in an effort to stay put. He didn’t want to be caught — not by Dumbledore and not by the portraits who could wake at any second. But Harry needed to know. He had to know what the hat had seen swirling inside his head to think he was best suited for Slytherin. 

“Sod it.” Harry mumbled as he walked quietly around the desk and lifted the hat from its resting place on the shelf. He was about to lower the smelly thing once again over his head when it moved. 

Harry almost dropped it in his his fright. 

“It has been a long time, Harry Potter.” The hat’s ancient voice sounded, and Harry stole a scared glance at the portraits. They were still snoring. “Bee in your bonnet?”

“Er, yes.” Harry muttered, hoping the hat would catch the hint to speak lowly. “Er — sorry to bother you — I just wanted to ask —”

“You’ve been wondering whether I put you in the right House, correct?” The hat guessed smartly, and Harry had the distinct impression that it was smug. “I knew you would come — sooner or later. You were particularly difficult to place, Harry Potter, but I haven’t wavered from what I’d said before.” Harry’s heart leaped in his chest, his stomach turning in nausea. “You would have done greatly in Slytherin.”

Harry hurriedly placed the Sorting Hat back on its shelf, stumbling away from it. He felt sick. 

“You’re wrong.” He said with as much conviction as he could manage. 

“Be it as it may, Harry Potter,” the hat said, “Slytherin would have understood your ambitions and desires, and it would have enabled you to pursue them to their fullest. It is indeed a shame your precocity made up your little mind against taking a chance at greatness.”

“You seem very found of Slytherin.” Harry commented, the hat’s words leaving a bad taste on his mouth. “If you were to be placed over the heir’s head, would you have recognised him?”

The hat chuckled at him, “You are like a dog with a bone, Harry Potter.” The hat commented. “Sometime it’d be smarter to assess the bone you are chasing after before it’s too late.” Harry didn’t understand what it meant. “But answering your question — yes, I would have been able to pinpoint the heir easily.” 

“Do you know something about Theo Nott?” Harry asked tentatively, begging the hat to understand his meaning. 

“Is that the question you really want answered, Harry Potter?” The hat mocked him. “I know many things about Theo Nott, indeed. A rather fascinating young wizard, of… unusual powers, to put it mildly. A carbon copy of his parents — the same witty, sly, temperamental little thing as they are. I look forward to his development — the surprise on everyone’s faces once it happens.”

“Is he the heir?” Harry asked clearly, not liking how his skin erupted in goosebumps. 

“How would you like Theo to be the heir, Harry Potter?”

Harry didn’t have time to come up with an answer as the half-plucked turkey standing on a golden perch behind the door caught on fire. Harry yelled in shock and backed away from the desk, ignoring the hat’s amused chuckles. 

Right then the office door opened and Dumbledore came in, looking somber than the last time Harry had seen him. 

“Professor,” Harry gasped, “your bird — I couldn’t do anything — it just caught fire —”

To Harry’s astonishment, the headmaster smiled, “About time, too.” He said. “He’s been looking dreadful for days; I’ve been telling him to get a move on, but Fawkes has always been quite the stubborn Phoenix.” Dumbledore continued to smile softly at his confusion, and Harry finally felt himself relax. “Phoenixes burst into flame when it is time for them to die and are reborn from the ashes, Harry.”

Harry looked down in time to see a tiny, wrinkled, newborn bird poke its head out of the ashes. It was quite as ugly as the old one, but Dumbledore spoke so softly of Fawkes that Harry controlled his urge to grimace at the sight. 

“It’s a shame you had to see him on a Burning Day.” Dumbledore commented, seating himself behind his desk. “He’s really very handsome most of the time, wonderful red and gold plumage. Fascinating creatures, phoenixes. They can carry immensely heavy leads, their tears have healing powers, and they make highly faithful pets.”

Harry was then reminded of why he was there when the seriousness returned to the headmaster’s expression. 

“Professor, I swear —”

“I do not think you attacked those people, Harry.” Dumbledore reassured him patiently. “But I still want to talk to you. Is there anything you would like to tell me, Harry?”

Harry shifted his weight nervously between his feet. 

Yes, he wanted to answer. There were many things he wanted to get out of his chest. He wanted to reveal that he was a Perselmouth, and had no idea what to do with or what to make of that ability. He wanted to finally vent how scared he has been feeling every time he roamed the hallways alone, afraid he would hear the invisible voice again and be once more rendered useless as it attempt to murder another person. 

He wanted to tell Dumbledore what the hat had told him — how fit for Slytherin Harry was. How he was an imposter in the lion’s den. And he wanted to tell Dumbledore his suspicions, so the headmaster could save the students by taking Nott away from the castle. 

But… but Harry had no proof to accuse the Slytherin; and trying so desperately to clean his name might make him even more suspicious. To reveal he could speak the language of snakes, would be admitting he had the mark of a Dark Wizard to the wizard who represented the Light. To admit he could hear an invisible voice… would be the same as signing his own madness certificate. 

“No.” Harry answered weakly. “There isn’t anything, Professor…”

“Alright.” Dumbledore smiled again, his blue eyes penetrating as he stared at Harry. “But do remember, Harry, you are not alone. I am here at your disposal — for whatever it is you may need.”

“Thanks, professor.” Harry managed to utter, taking the headmaster’s nod as his cue to leave. 

Harry became a recluse as the days passed. He woke up early so he wouldn’t be ogled by a crowd when he ate his breakfast at the Great Hall; he went to lunch and dinner the latest possible for the same reason. His stomach complained as he had to eat the left-overs at the Gryffindoor table, but he preferred it that way. 

It was as if a switch had been turned. The slight fearful mood turned into a wave of panic as soon as word spread about Justin and Nearly Headless Nick. There were very few things which could damage the dead but somehow the Slytherin monster had managed to severe a ghost, turn it to the colour of carbon. None felt safe anymore, and more and more students were returning home for Christmas Break. 

Harry wondered if all of them would be returning. 

The school hasn’t notified the parents as far as he knew — apart from those of the petrified victims —, but Harry was sure that the situation wouldn’t remain hidden for much longer. And he feared the consequences. 

He noticed with irritation the way Nott and Malfoy continued to venture outside in the snow, the way the two continued to roam the hallways with their heads held high and the way Nott’s pranks never ceased. It was like he enjoyed spurring on the panic. It was like he enjoyed terrifying younger and older students alike. 

It was sick. Completely twisted. 

When he commented on it to Hermione, she had looked at him with a satisfied expression on her face, “Not for long.” She had said. “The Polyjuice Potion’s nearly ready. We’ll be getting the truth out of them any day now.”

Christmas Break was one day away and a silence as deep as the snow on the grounds descended on the castle. Harry found it almost peaceful. He was enjoying his slumber in bed when the door of his dormitory banged open. 

“Wake up!” Hermione said loudly, pulling back the curtains at the window and waking up all the five boys who had been sleeping. 

“Hermione — you’re not supposed to be in here —” Ron said angrily, shielding his eyes against the light as Dino cursed colourfully from within his fourposter bed.

“Get changed, you two.” Hermione commanded them snappily, retreating towards the door. “It’s ready.”

Harry sat up, suddenly awake, “Are you sure?” he asked, changing his clothes out of Hermione’s line of sight.

“Positive.” She responded with a victorious smile. “Right on time, too. We are doing it tonight.”

“What’s she talking about?” Neville asked in confusion, his hair sticking out in all directions as he peered from a small gap on his curtains. 

“Who cares?” Seamus snapped, his Irish accent thicker than usual. “Ron, Harry you either kick her out or you get out in two seconds. I want to sleep! And close the freaking hangers!”

Harry and Ron hurried out of the room, Ron stumbling on his open trunk as he went to do as Seamus asked, and they found Hermione waiting for them in the deserted stairs.

“What the hell were you thinking, Hermione?!” Ron demanded. 

“I’ve been up for hours.” She said matter-of-factly, completely ignoring Ron. “I’ve added more lacewings to the potion already. It’s perfect! But we have to act today, and fast. The train leaves tomorrow and we can’t risk letting Nott go without our answers.”

“Do you even know what time it is?” Ron snapped. “I swear, Hermione — Nott and Malfoy are not even awake right now! Has your brilliant brain considered that? Or were you planning on interrogating them on their sleep?!”

“Do you think I don’t know that, Ronald?” Hermione hissed back, and Harry was waiting for the moment when they would manage to enrage all the sleeping Gryffindoors by waking them at the crack of dawn. “You forget you still need a bit of the people you’re changing into. Obviously, it’s best if we can get something of Crabbe’s and Goyle’s. Malfoy and Nott know how thick they are — I reckon anything you do wrong will be dismissed as their usual stupidity.”

“How nice of you to assumed only Harry and I will screw up, Hermione.” Ron remarked dryly, his eyes flashing angrily at her. 

“And we also need to make sure the real Crabbe and Goyle can’t bust in on us while we’re interrogating Nott and Malfoy.” Hermione continued as if he hadn’t spoken a word. “I’ve got it all worked out, of course. I’ve nicked some Sleeping Draught from the Hospital Wing the last time I went to help Madam Pomfrey — for extra credit, of course —, and I will fill some plump chocolate cakes with it. All you have to do is make sure Crabbe and Goyle find them. You have the whole day to find the best moment. Once they’re asleep, pull out a few of their hairs and hide them in a broom closet.”

“Hermione, I don’t think —” Harry started, but Ron cut him off. 

“Couldn’t you have told us that later?” He roared. “Merlin’s pants, Hermione! Today is Friday — we have lessons all day long and so do the Slytherins. Do you really think no one will notice Crabbe and Goyle missing?!”

Harry cringed at the loud volume, and the look of horror that flashed on Hermione’s face as she realised Ron was right. Her horror turned to irritation in a blink. 

“Excuse me for being the only one precocious, Ronald.” She snapped. “If you want to investigate Nott and Malfoy, I suggest you do as I say. We need Crabbe’s and Goyle’s hair ready after dinner and not a minute later.”

“Alright, alright.” Harry said before Ron could say another word. “But what about you? Whose hair are you ripping out?”

“I’ve already got mine, of course!” Hermione told him brightly, pulling a tiny bottle out of her robe’s pocket and showing them the single hair inside it. “Remember Millicent Bulstrode — the girl paired with me at the Duelling Club? She left this on my robes. And she is always hovering around Parkinson, who is always chasing after Malfoy. It won’t be weird if she’s there, too.” 

Already awake — and hungry — Harry and Ron decided to have an extreme early breakfast as Hermione left them alone to check on their potion once more. 

Harry could feel annoyance coming out of Ron in waves. 

“Have you ever heard of a plan where so many things could go wrong?” He asked Harry rhetorically. “I swear, Harry, Hermione is driving me insane! I hope Nott hates Bulstrode — that’ll show Hermione.”

Harry said nothing, not wanting to agree, but not entirely disagreeing either. 

He just followed Ron silently and kept his head down during all lessons that day, pretending to share the joy of the upcoming Christmas. 

As Hermione had instructed, they lurked outside the Great Hall after the dinner feast and, like always, Crabbe and Goyle were the last ones to exit through the doors — only leaving when the last bit of food had vanished from the table. Harry perched the chocolate cakes filled with the draught on the end of the banisters as soon as he spotted the two Slytherins coming, and he and Ron quickly hid behind a suit of armour next to the big double doors. 

“How thick can you get?” Ron whispered ecstatically as Crabbe gleefully pointed out the cakes to Goyle and grabbed them. Grinning stupidly, they stuffed the cakes whole into their large mouths. 

For a moment, both of them chewed greedily, looks of triumph on their fat faces. Then, without the smallest change of expression, they both keeled over backward onto the floor. 

Harry struggled, sweat forming on his forehead despite the freezing winter wind coming from outside, as he and Ron dragged Crabbe and Goyle to the closet across the hall. Once the two were safely stowed among the buckets and mops, Harry yanked out a couple of the bristles that covered Goyle’s forehead and Ron — indelicately — pulled out several of Goyle’s hairs. They also sneakily stole the Slytherins’ shoes and their robes, running in the shadows to the Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom once they were done. 

They could hardly see a thing clearly due to the thick black smoke issuing from the stall in which Hermione was stirring the contents in their makeshift cauldron. Pulling their robes up to cover their faces, Harry and Ron knocked softly on the door. 

“Hermione?

They heard the scrape of the lock and Hermione emerged, shiny-faced and looking anxious. Behind her they heard the gloop-gloop of the bubbling, glutinous potion. There glass tumblers stood ready on the toilet seat. 

“Did you get them?” Hermione asked them sternly, as if she still doubted they would manage the simplest of tasks on their own. 

Harry just showed her Goyle’s hair. 

“I’m sure I’ve done everything right!” Hermione declared snappily, her voice shrill in indignation as Ron peered inside the cauldron with a disgusted expression on his face, eyeing the thick, dark, mud potion bubbling sluggishly. “It looks like the book says it should… once we’ve drunk it, we’ll have exactly an hour before we change back into ourselves.”

Hermione didn’t wait for them to say anything as she divided the potion into the three glasses and handed one to each of them, motioning for them to add the hair. Harry almost dropped his when the potion hissed loudly like a boiling kettled and frothed madly, turning a sickly shade of khaki. 

Harry felt like puking already. The smell coming out of it was putrid. 

As he downed the potion in one brave gulp, he immediately felt his insides starting to writhe as though he had just swallowed live snakes. The burning sensation spread rapidly through his stomach, reaching the very end of his fingers and toes, bringing him gasping to all fours in front of the stall he had entered in case he actually puked after having a taste of Goyle, and a melting feeling overtook him. 

His skin was bubbling as hot wax and, before his eyes, his hands began to grow, fat forming around his fingers and knuckles bulging. His shoulders stretched painfully and a prickling on his forehead told him his scar was disappearing, and hair was creeping down towards his eyebrows. His robes ripped as his whole body extended and, amid gasps of pain, Harry berated himself for not changing clothes before taking the potion. 

As soon as it started, the transformation stopped, and Harry started to shakily change.

“Are you two okay?” Harry asked, somewhat startled at hearing Goyle’s voice echoing over Myrtle’s moaning in the ample bathroom. 

“Yeah.” Came the deep grunt Harry recognised as being Crabbe’s, and he knew Ron’s transformation had gone successfully — if one could call becoming Crabbe a good thing. 

Harry unlocked his door and stepped in front of the cracked mirror. Goyle stared back at him with dull, deep-set eyes. Harry scratched his ear. So did Goyle. 

It was the strangest thing he has ever experienced. 

Ron had a similar expression on his face as he came out, “Unbelievable” he said, poking at his cheek, than Harry’s. 

“Come on, Hermione!” Harry said as loud as he dared with Goyle’s voice, wincing at the deep grunt. “We need to go —”

“I—I don’t think I’m going to come after all. You go on without me.” Came a high-pitched response.

“Hermione,” Ron said impatiently, “we know Millicent Bulstrode’s ugly, no one’s going to know it’s you —”

“No — really — I don’t think I’ll come. You two hurry up, you’re wasting time, — make sure not to be too obvious or Nott will know something’s wrong… and don’t waste any time! Remember, the potion will only last one hour!”

“Hermione,” Harry stared tentatively, sharing a bewildered look with Ron, “are you okay?”

“Fine, just fine! Just go, Harry! You’re wasting time!”

“Come on, Harry.” Ron whispered close to his ear. “We’re better off without her glaring at us the whole time, anyway.”

Harry nodded reluctantly, leading the way to the door and checking up and down the corridor to make sure it was as deserted as it sounded. They went down the marble staircase and stopped when they realised they had no idea where the Slytherin Common Room was, and there was not a single snake around to guide them there. 

“Any ideas?” Harry muttered.  

“The Slytherins always come up to breakfast over there.” Ron said, nodding at the entrance of the dungeons. The words were barely out of his mouth when a girl with long, curly hair emerged from the entrance. She was admittedly beautiful, but Harry shook his head at the mere notion. 

She was a Slytherin. She would probably grow older to be another version of Nott’s mother. 

“Excuse me,” Ron called, hurrying up to her and scrunching up his face in his best imitation of Crabbe — Harry was impressed. He looked exactly as the dumb Slytherin every time a professor asked him a question. “We’ve forgotten the way to our common room.”

“I beg your pardon?” The girl said stiffly, her voice regal. Aristocratic. Harry had only recently started to notice that the most notorious Purebloods seemed to have that in common, as if they were trained since birth to behave as little lords. “Our Common Room?” She showed them a badge which looked like the one Percy always had stuck to his robes. “I’m a Ravenclaw.”

Harry felt his face reddening. 

He had made an assumption. A wrong assumption. 

Ron pushed him down the stone steps in a rush, tripping into the darkness as their footsteps echoed loudly. Harry didn’t think this was going to be half as easy as Hermione made it out to be. 

Walking the dungeons on their own was like trying to figure out their way out of a labyrinth. They walked deeper and deeper under the school, the air getting chillier the more they walked. Harry was afraid to even blink, his mind conjuring all types of scenarios in which the Slytherin monster materialised in front of them, wet from the waters of the lake surrounding the dungeons from the outside. 

They checked their watches every few seconds, and desperation was gripping Harry’s heart tightly as he realised a quarter of an hour had already gone by. He didn’t know if it was relief or terror twirling inside him when he heard sudden movement ahead. 

“Ha!” Ron said excitedly. “There must be one of them now!”

The figure was emerging from a side room. As they hurried nearer, however, their excitement sunk. It wan’t a Slytherin. It was Percy Weasley. 

“What’re you doing here?” Ron questioned in surprise, obviously forgetting that his older brother had no way of knowing that it was him standing there. 

Percy looked affronted, “That,” he said stiffly, “is none of your business. It’s Crabbe, isn’t it?”

“Wh — oh, yeah.” Ron said. 

“Well, get off to your dormitories.” Percy commanded sternly. “It’s not safe to go wandering around in the dark corridors there days.”

“You are.” Ron pointed out. 

“I” Percy said, drawing himself up, “am a Prefect. Nothing’s about to attack me. Come now, I’ll personally walk you back to your Common Room.”

Satisfied, neither Harry nor Ron said a word in protest as they followed Percy, turning into the next passage and pausing by a stretch of bare, damp stone wall. 

“Well?” Percy demanded impatiently. 

“We forgot the password.” Ron said with a shrug, while Harry tentatively — feeling dumb — knocked on the wall. 

He was afraid nothing was going to happen and Percy would take them to Snape when a stone door concealed in the wall slid open as it formed, and Malfoy’s blond head appeared in the gap. 

“Look at that, you’re alive.” Malfoy drawled. “Theo owes me two galleons.”

“What?” Ron asked, and his tilted head and confused expression convinced Malfoy he was indeed talking to Crabbe. 

“I bet you’d gotten lost on your way here without some poor soul to guide you back.” Malfoy smirked evilly. “Theo thought you’d finally eaten each other.” He arched a pale eyebrow as he noticed Percy still standing there. “What are you doing down here, Weasel?”

“You’ll want to show a bit more respect to a school Prefect!” Percy bellowed outraged. “I don’t care for your attitude!”

Malfoy sneered, “Whatever, Weasel. If you were smart at all you’d sell that stupid badge and save yourself some sickles. Crabbe, Goyle, come.” The blond ordered and, resisting the urge to defend Percy, Harry followed him inside, closing the door on Percy’s face himself. 

The Slytherin Common Room was a long, low underground room with rough stone walls and ceiling from which round, greenish lamps were hanging on chains. A fire was crackling under an elaborately carved mantelpiece ahead of them, where a lone Nott was sitting crosslegged on the rug in front of it with a box spilling wrapping paper resting on his lap. 

“So, you’re alive.” Nott drawled lazily. “And here I thought my luck was improving. Guess that Pansy going to bed early with cramps and you disappearing would be too much fortune for just one day.”

Harry tried to copy Malfoy as he laughed and, nodding at Ron, he began to follow the blond to the black leather armchairs positioned in front of the fire. 

It was a strange sight. The Gryffindoor Common Room would be bustling with activity at this time of the night. The twins would be probably entertaining a crowd with their ideas, and various groups would be spread around, playing a game of cards or wizarding chess. It was warm up there. It was comforting to be surrounding by such palpable happiness. 

Slytherin was just… cold. There was no one around. There was only an eerie silence reigning. 

“Don’t you two have anything better to do than stare at us like two overgrown morons?” Nott snapped at them, looking at Malfoy, who just shrugged. Harry reckoned the blond was used to Crabbe’s and Goyle’s stupid presences, having spent their first-year just with the two goons as company. “Go bother Zabini, why won’t you?”

“Zabini’s in detention, remember?” Malfoy reminded him absently, his fingers playing with the green and silver wrapping paper from Nott’s box as he laid sideways on the chair, eyes closing. “For attaching that Mandrake to Sally-Anne Perk’s hair.”

Harry felt a pang of sympathy for the small Ravenclaw, Malfoy was referring to, as he remembered that he saw the asian girl with red-rimmed eyes stalking the hallways that day. Her hair, previously a black straight blanket cascading down her back, had been bouncing at shoulder-length. 

“I thought Zabini was the tamed one.” Ron mumbled, losing his balance on Crabbe’s body and falling heavily on the armchair beside Malfoy’s. 

“You two are such idiots.” Malfoy said. 

“I messed with Perks.” Nott deadpanned slowly, rolling his eyes. The light of the fire casted a shadow on him, and Harry thought he was the perfect picture of the heir with half of his face melting into darkness, his cheeks hollow and a green twinge coming from above him. “But seeing as I’ve spent every single night of the year in detention, Zabini’s agreed to take one for the team.”

“We should just dump every prank on Crabbe and Goyle.” Malfoy suggested with a yawn, stretching his long limbs. 

“No one will buy that.” Nott drawled. “They’re not smart enough to pull anything.”

Harry was thinking of a way to start their interrogation when Nott yelped in happiness, holding up a black leather jacket from the package. It looked used, the leather was worn out close to the pockets, and thorn-like pins were sticking out from the elbows and shoulder blades. 

“Finally!” Nott exclaimed, actually smiling. “I’ve been asking mom to give me this jacket for ages!”

“I never thought your mother would be one for leather.” Malfoy commented, his tone lighter. Friendly as Harry had never heard it, and he climbed down the armchair to sit on the floor next to Nott, triggering a gasp from Harry. 

He had never pictured Malfoy looking so… casual. 

“She isn’t, really.” Nott shrugged. “She has, like, tones of those jackets and some other clothes from when she lived in the Muggle World. I always nick the ones I like, and sometimes she gifts them to me.”

“It’s not Christmas yet.” Harry said dumbly. 

Nott groaned, “As I’ve been saying since the first of December,” he said snappily, “my mom sends me small presents every day until Christmas with clues. If I can figure out what is under the tree, she goes flying with me on New Year.” 

Harry could only blink at the revelation. The image that Nott painted of his mother did not fit with the one Harry had created on his mind. 

“So —” Ron started, stuttering slightly, “you mother’s lived in the Muggle world? I—I thought they were  all scum.”

“I can’t deal with them anymore.” Nott said to Malfoy. “There’s a limit to thickness, Draco, and they crossed it when they said Potter’s the heir.”

“But isn’t he?” Harry asked, trying to crane his neck as he had seen Goyle doing in class, heart thundering in his chest. This was their chance. “Everyone’s saying he attacked the Mug — the Mudbloods.”

“I always wonder if the inside of your cranium is just filled with pantries, Goyle, seriously.” 

Malfoy laughed loudly, looking at Harry with a condescending look on his face, “Potter is too scared of being remotely like a Slytherin to pull something like that, Goyle.” He said matter-of-factly, and Harry’s stomach twisted at how spot on Malfoy was. “More so when he has Mudblood-Granger breathing down his neck every minute of every day.” 

“I pity Potter sometimes.” Nott commented as he tried on the jacket, looking satisfied as he adjusted the wrists. He didn’t seem bothered by the loose fit, the jacket clearly having been made for an adult. “It’s like he has no personality at all. Letting someone like Granger speak for him, push him around like a puppet… at least the Weasel snaps back at her every once in a while.”

Harry slumped back, feeling… weirdly empty. 

Nott pitied him. He hadn’t claim to hate Harry, or to be annoyed by him. He had expected to find Nott jealous of him, of his fame, that Harry was allowed to play Quidditch while Nott’s mother forbade him to. He had not expected to be pitied. Had not expected to have Nott describing him not with an actual adjective, but with a lack thereof. 

No personality. Was that really how Harry was perceived? As if he had no mind of his own? 

He didn’t know. But, then again, he was the hero for so many. Perhaps those people were merely filling in the blanks with the miraculous defeat of Voldemort by Harry’s hands — and nothing more. He was the hero. Just the hero. Not the brave hero, or the cheeky hero, or the powerful hero, or the relentless hero. Just the hero. Acclaimed by something he couldn’t remember doing. 

“I don’t know if pity is the word I’d use.” Malfoy said, reading the piece of parchment Nott had laid next to him. He cracked a laugh. “Nice one. — Entitled maybe.” Malfoy continued. “Potter walks around as if the world owes him something because the Dark Lord killed his parents. News flash, Potter — lots of people died in the war. It’s not like that scar gives him any power. Potter is mediocre at magic at best — and he thinks his status will make up for his incompetence when he struts into every lesson expecting to be venerated for knowing what’s the right end of the quill.”

“You shouldn’t let Potter get to you, Drakey.” Nott said dismissively, though his words sounded heavy with meaning as he stared at Malfoy’s frowning, sulking expressing with the kindest silver eyes, Harry has ever seen from him. “This fascination with him will die down with time. Then what will he have, really? You should just ignore him. Haven’t you realise how much I irk him just by not paying attention to him at all?” Nott finished, smirking nastily at the end.

“But if Potter isn’t the heir, then who is?” Ron asked, his hands balled into fists on Harry’s behalf. 

“I couldn’t care less.” Nott shrugged, and Harry straightened himself at the actual disinterest he detected in Nott’s tone. He was really more concerned with his new/old jacket than with the heir’s identity. It really wasn’t him. “I just hope Granger’s finally convinced Golden Boy and the Weasel it’s me, though.” 

Malfoy laughed loudly, “She thinks she’s being subtle,” he cracked between gulps of air. 

“What?” Harry asked breathlessly. 

“Salazar, Goyle,” Malfoy groaned, wiping tears from the corners of his eyes, “if you were any slower, you’d be going backward.”

“Granger” Nott drawled lazily, taking a pair of fingerless cloves from the box and smiling widely before turning back to Harry with a bored expression, “has been trembling and paling every time she sees me since Filch’s cat became stone. Besides, she is as shrill as Weasley-mother. She thinks she’s being quite but I’ve heard her telling Potter countless of times that my mom opened the Chamber when she was in school, and now I’m controlling the monster myself. My wish — I would’ve set it after her before I wasted time petrifying that useless cat.”

“So… you don’t know who opened the Chamber before?” Ron asked, looking as bewildered as Harry was. 

They had known it all along. Both of them had known about the trio’s suspicions. 

And the Slytherins’ have been playing with them — playing with their fears.

“Does it matter?” Nott asked them with a shrug. “What are the chances of it being the same…” Nott left his words hanging in the air, never completing his thoughts as he stared emptily at the flames. 

“I heard my father speaking about it.” Malfoy said sombrely, his gaze edgy as he looked at Nott’s profile, as if convinced he wouldn’t need to bother with Crabbe and Goyle listening in — convinced that his two goons would be too stupid to understand. “He said the Chamber was opened fifty years ago, and a Mudblood died. I reckon maybe it’s just a matter of time before one’s killed this time around. — Hopefully, it will be Granger.”

“Nah, deaths are far too complicated. Too much bureaucracy.” Nott commented, as if he had contemplated it before. “But I wouldn’t worry. That snooty beaver has annoyed more than half the school. Chances are the heir is already tired of her as well.”

“If there’s an heir, that is…” Malfoy remarked, but Harry didn’t understand what he meant. Nott did, though,  and he snapped his head in the direction of the blond. 

Ron was clenching Crabbe’s gigantic fists. Feeling that it would be a bit of a giveaway if Ron punched one of the two Slytherins, Harry shot him a warning look and continued the conversation, “D’you know if the person who opened the Chamber the last time was caught?”

“Rumour has it they were expelled.” Malfoy said with a wave of his hand. 

“My mom is wor—” Nott started to say and Harry was listening avidly, wanting to know what his mother thought of what was happening, but the other boy stopped, standing up suddenly and approaching Harry and Ron with a frown, “What’s wrong with your faces?”

Harry immediately knew their hour must be up — and they were transforming back into themselves. 

They both jumped to their feet. 

“Stomachache — need medicine —” Ron grunted, and without further ado they sprinted the length of the Slytherin Common Room, hurled themselves at the stone wall and dashed up the passage, but Harry noticed Nott had drawn his wand, and Malfoy was looking alarmed as he, too, stared suspiciously at them. 

They knew something wasn’t adding up. 

Harry could feel his feet slipping around Goyle’s huge shoes and had to hoist up his robes as he shrunk in size. Hopefully, there will be no one roaming the corridors to bear witness. They climbed up the steps into the dark Entrance Hall, which was full of a muffled pounding coming from the closet where they’d locked Crabbe and Goyle. 

Leaving their shoes and capes outside the closet door, Harry and Ron sprinted in their socks up the marble staircase toward the second floor girls’ bathroom. 

“Well —” Ron panted, “it wasn’t a complete waste of time. At least we know the heir is neither of them and can start investigating somewhere else.”

Harry nodded, checking his face in the cracked mirror. He was back to normal. He put his glasses back on as Ron hammered on the door of Hermione’s stall. 

“Hermione, come out, we’ve got loads to tell you — you were wrong, by the way!” Ron said loudly. 

“Go away!” Hermione squeaked, her voice back to normal — her normal shrill, just as Nott had called it. 

Harry and Ron exchanged a puzzled glance. 

“Oooooooh, wait ‘till you see!” Moaning Myrtle glided suddenly, looking the happiest Harry has ever seen her. “It’s awful —”

They heard the lock slide back and Hermione emerged, sobbing, her robes rolled up over her head. 

“What’s up?” Ron asked uncertainly. “Have you still got Millicent’s nose or something?”

Hermione let her robes fall and Ron backed into the sink. Her face was covered in black fur. Her eyes had turned yellow and there were long pointed ears poking thought her hair. She had morphed half-way into a cat, the sight sickening and amusing at the same time.

“Blimey!” Ron exclaimed. “And she thought we were gonna screw up.”

Hermione sobbed louder. 

“Not now, Ron.” Harry hissed, not knowing if he should offer Hermione some comfort of pretend that he hadn’t noticed anything was amiss. 

“It was c-cat hair!” She howled. “M-Millicent Bulstrode m-must have a cat! And the p-potion isn’t s-supposed to be used for animal transformations!”

Ron chocked on his laugh, trying to remain serious. 

“You’ll be teased something dreadful!” Myrtle said gleefully. 

“It’s okay, Hermione.” Harry said quickly. “We’ll take you up to the Hospital Wing. Madam Pomfrey never asks too many questions… ”

It took them a long time to persuade Hermione to leave the bathroom, and their promises of no one ever knowing what happened went down the drain when Moaning Myrtle sped along the hallway, screaming, “Wait ‘till everyone find out you’ve got a tail!”

Despite having a distressed Hermione using his shoulder as a pillow, Harry couldn’t help but think about Nott and Malfoy, probably still by the fireplace in their Common Room, discussing the clue Nott’s mother sent him with his gift. 

He couldn’t help but wonder if the two Slytherins would link Hermione’s transformation with the strange way Crabbe and Goyle had been behaving that night. If they would link the accident Nott knew had been Harry’s work at potions and the stolen ingredients. 

He wondered if the Slytherins would get back at them if they found out about the Polyjuice Potion. 

And the dread settled in when he realised that there was no way Nott would choose to ignore what they had done.

Chapter Text

He had been unable to stop thinking about Nott’s words, then, as he invited Ron to come with him, but his friend just shook his head stubbornly, claiming to be tired of being Hermione’s chewing toy. 

The bushy-haired girl had been very nasty to them, but Harry had tried to understand her reasoning. She had complained about the questions they asked Malfoy and Nott, and remarked endlessly on their incompetence, claiming they wouldn’t have wasted so much time searching the dungeons for the Common Room had she been there with them. Harry had swallowed his urge to snap angrily at her, reminding himself that Hermione had a bucket on her bedside table because she was vomiting hairballs. He tried to remind himself that Hermione was a Muggle-Born, so she had more reason to be afraid. 

Still, though, he had behaved in the way Nott had accused him of behaving. 

He had thought he would feel relief at having Nott gone for the holidays, but then Harry had realised that the other boy had been all he had focused on all year long. Without Nott there for Harry to observe, without him there for Harry to judge and without his pranks for Harry to criticise, Harry had gotten… bored. 

Classes had started again in January, but the mood had worsened even more. Many hadn’t come back from home, deciding to stay behind while the heir and the monster were still on the loose. 

The twins had called such people cowards. They said their parents never even broached the subject, sure that Dumbledore would catch the culprit in no time, and that certainly all the teachers were investigating. 

But Harry seriously questioned if they were. 

McGonagall had told him the year before that the Philosopher Stone was protected, that none would find or even dare take it and if an attempt was ever made, the professors would know to act immediately. Still, Voldemort had infiltrated the school, he had stayed in close proximity to hundreds of students all year long and almost held the stone in his hands — well, Quirrell’s —, and none had been the wiser. 

So Harry had continued to go visit Hermione and bring her her homework every single day and discussed with her who the heir could be. 

They had gotten nowhere, though. Nott and Malfoy were still the only obvious options they could come up with — and they had been wrong. 

Harry had just dropped Hermione’s potions homework for her when he met Ron waiting for him outside, pacing the entrance of the Hospital Wing as if debating if he should enter or not. He seemed relieved upon seeing Harry — and letting his presence decide it for him. 

Together Harry and Ron climbed the stairs towards Gryffindor Tower, both of them dreading the afternoon they would have ahead of them. Snape had given them so much work to be done for the next lesson, Harry thought he wasn’t likely to finish it in time for his graduation. 

Ron was saying he had only considered going see Hermione to ask her how many rat tails one was supposed to add to a Hair Raising Potion when an angry outburst from the floor above reached their ears. 

“That’s Filch.” Harry muttered as they hurried up the stairs and paused out of sight, listening hard. 

“You don’t think someone else’s been attacked?” Ron asked tensely. 

They stood still, their heads inclined toward Filch’s voice, which sounded quite hysterical, “Even more work for me! Mopping all night, like I haven’t got enough to do! No, this is the final straw, I’m going to Dumbledore —”

His footsteps receded along the out-of-sight corridor and they heard a distinct door slam. Ron breathed more easily, a bitter smile growing on his face, “Probably just Nott pulling another prank.” He said. “It’d be, like, the fourth one since he’s been back, right?”

“Fifth.” Harry corrected him. “I heard some Ravenclaws saying that he hexed all Lockhart’s quills to write mocking lyrics about him today. This girl said Lockhart couldn’t fix it and, by the end of the lesson, there wasn’t one blank piece of parchment in the whole classroom.”

“I wouldn’t have minded seeing that.” Ron commented wistfully. “Lockhart must be the smarmiest bloke I’ve ever met.”

They poked their heads around the corner to notice Filch had clearly been manning his usual lookout post: they were once again on the spot where Mrs. Norris had been attacked. They saw at a glance what he had been shouting about, and Harry doubted Nott would bother with something so… mild. 

A great flood of water stretched over half the corridor, and it looked as though it was still seeping from under the door of Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom. Now that Filch had stopped shouting, they could hear Myrtle’s wails echoing off the bathroom walls. 

“Now what’s up with her?” Ron asked exasperated. 

“Let’s go and see.” Harry shrugged, curious to know how a ghost had caused a flood. Holding his robes over his ankles he stepped through the great wash of water to the door bearing its OUT OF ORDER sign, he ignored it as always and entered. 

Moaning Myrtle was crying louder than Harry has ever heard it in the far end of the bathroom with her head poking out of the wood of the last stall. Harry was about to ask her what was wrong when he noticed a small, thin book lying under the sink. It had a shabby black cover and was as wet as everything else in the bathroom. 

Harry picked it up carefully, fearing it would somehow tear his face like that one book in the library had attempted once. He gave a relieved sigh when nothing happened. He immediately saw it was a diary and the faded year written in silver on the cover told him it was fifty years old, and it belong to a ’T. M. Riddle’.

“Hang on,” Ron said, looking at the cover over Harry’s shoulder, “I know that name… T. M. Riddle got an award for special services to the school fifty years ago.”

“How on earth do you know that Ron?” 

“Because Filch made me polish his award shield about sixty times in detention.” Ron explained with a grimace. “That was the one Nott put the slugs on. If you’d wiped slime off a name for an hour, you’d remember it too, trust me.”

Harry peeled the wet pages apart. They were completely blank. There wasn’t the faintest trace of writing on any of them, not even an aunt’s birthday, or dentist appointments scheduled. Nothing at all. 

“He never wrote on it.” Harry noted, disappointed. 

“I wonder why someone wanted to flush it away?” Ron wondered curiously. 

Harry was examining the back cover, noticing the stamp of a store in Muggle London, which he thought indicated T. M. Riddle was at least a Half-Blood, if not a Muggle-Born when he heard voices approaching the bathroom over Myrtle’s incessant wailing. 

“They’re coming here.” Ron noticed the same as him. 

“Let’s hide in the stall!” Harry said hurriedly, putting the diary inside his open bag and leaving a gap with the stall’s door so he could see who had ventured into the blocked bathroom. 

“This is the only place left for us to look.” Malfoy was saying, his voice as edgy as it had been that night before Christmas Break. 

He and Nott were talking in hushed tones as they entered the bathroom, the black-haired one closing the door behind him after checking they hadn’t been followed inside. Nott was wearing the oversized jacket and fingerless gloves his mother had sent him, and Harry wondered if maybe Lady Nott had enchanted those gloves to be warm, as he couldn’t fantom how Nott was able to stand the cold as they clearly had come from outside, since snow colouring his hair as white as Malfoy’s. 

“If I wanted to hide something, I would definitely do it here.” Nott said. “This place is disgusting. I doubt anyone would come in here.”

“It’s hunted, too.” Malfoy commented absently, and Harry exchanged a panicked look with Ron. The blond was circling the sinks and ducking his head under every stall in search of whatever it was that he and Nott wanted. It would be a matter of seconds until he discovered Harry and Ron trying to balance themselves on top of the toilet to keep their feet hidden. “This crazed out ghost — Myrtle, I think her name is — stays here. Sobbing and wailing, if what Pansy says is to be believed.”

“A ghost, you say?” Nott pondered out loud. Harry thanked him mentally when he spoke again, making Malfoy stop in front of where Harry and Ron were. “Hey, Myrtle! You there?!”

Moaning Myrtle left the usual toilet she hid under. Her hiccups which had become almost quiet since Harry had come in, turned back into the wails which had attracted him and Ron in the first place as her hunted gaze settled on Nott.

“What do you want now?” She sobbed hysterically. “Came to throw something else at me?!”

Nott arched an amused eyebrow as he looked up at her floating form, Malfoy coming back to his side, “I don’t remember throwing anything at you.” He said in his usual drawl. 

“Of course, you would say that — they all say that. Who would care about the Moaning Myrtle, right?!” Her eyes were bulging as she screamed louder and louder, floating closer to Nott with each word. But the Slytherin didn’t move a muscle, his mirth was only increasing. “She is just a ghost! She won’t feel anything if we throw darts at her! What was it that you said last time? Three galleons to whoever gets her between the eyes! Five if it goes through her mouth!”

“As good of a game as it sounds —” Nott started, but Myrtle wailed louder. 

“Where is the other one?! Where is the other boy?!” She shrieked, looking around her madly. “Is he hiding here somewhere?! Trying to catch me by surprise?!”

“There is no other boy!” Nott barked at her impatiently. “Merlin’s pants, you psycho, I’ve never even been here before!”

“Y-You…” Myrtle came closer, her sobs stopping just as suddenly as they had made an appearance. “What year are we in?”

“What type of stupid question —?” Nott snapped, but Malfoy rested a hand on his shoulder, peering at Myrtle curiously. 

“We are in January 1993.” The blond answered. 

“1993…?” Myrtle gasped dramatically. “I haven’t… I can see some differences now.” She said, eyes glued to Nott’s face. “You look so much like him.”

“Yeah, yeah, alive people look alike. Must be the colours.” He said mockingly. “Look, nutjob, we have some questions we’d like answered.”

“Why would I want to help you?” Myrtle asked him, her nose in the air. Nott just stared at her in boredom. 

“Because Draco and I are very cool fellows, and we promise to come to chat with you every once in a while so you won’t be so lonely.”

“Boys have never been interested in me before.” Myrtle said, her interest peaked. 

“That much is obvious —” Nott started, but Malfoy shook his head at him. 

“That’s really a shame, Myrtle.” Malfoy said, his voice dripping with false sweetness. “You’re such a lovely ghost. Theo and I would love to become your friends — if you’ll help us.” 

“What do you want to know?” Myrtle asked with a toothy smile, completely swayed.

“A lot of the attacks happened close to here.” Malfoy started, his tone never wavering. “Have you seen anything… unusual, Myrtle?”

“I don’t know anything about the attacks that happened.” She said remorsefully as if it actually pained her to not be able to help the Slytherins. “But there was something… I was sitting in the U-bend, thinking about death, when a book fell right through the top of my head. It caused the flood. The person seemed angry when the book didn’t stay down the drain.”

“Did you see who this person was?” Nott asked, trying and failing to make his voice sound sympathetic. 

“No.” Myrtle said. “I was too distracted. The person was already gone when I came.” 

“And this book, Myrtle,” Malfoy continued, “was it a diary, perhaps? With a black leather cover and silver writing?”

“Oh, yes, it was!” Myrtle chirped happily. “Is it yours?”

“No. But it’s very important Theo and I have it. Could you keep an eye out for it, Myrtle? And come tell us if you find anything?”

“Of course, Draco! I’ll be happy to help you!”

“Thank you, Myrtle.” Malfoy said with a charming smile. “We are very lucky to have you as our friend.”

Myrtle beamed at the blond, her usual sobs turning into the mumbling of a lyric Harry didn’t recognise and, as if in a trance, Moaning Myrtle went back to her toilet, a smile on her face. 

“Come on, lover boy.” Nott said, pushing Malfoy to the door. “We have to find who has it.”

The two Slytherins exited the bathroom, and Harry finally let out a breath he didn’t know he had been holding. As Ron made to open his mouth, Harry motioned for him to hush, nodding his head in the direction Myrtle had gone. Now that the ghost was loyal to Malfoy of all people, they couldn’t use her bathroom anymore; and they would have to be on the watch-out for her at all times. 

She couldn’t know they had been the ones who took the diary. 

As silently as they could, Harry and Ron tiptoed back into the corridor, making sure that Nott and Malfoy were nowhere in sight before they made their way to the tower they had intended to go to all along. 

“How do Nott and Malfoy know about the diary?” Ron asked nervously. “Why do they want it?”

“I don’t know.” Harry answered tiredly. “But it’s good that we have it and they don’t. Neither of them is the heir, but I don’t trust Nott and Malfoy. They’re up to no good.”

“Agreed. Should we tell, Hermione, though? Nott knew she had been onto him all along.”

“I think we should.” Harry said sincerely. “Hermione might not be… easy, but she is our friend, Ron. We need her.”

“Fine.” Ron mumbled, obviously not happy.  

Over the course of months, Harry found himself strangely… attached to T. M. Riddle’s diary. It felt magnetic somehow. He stared at the black cover and he felt a strange urge to caress it and brush away the invisible particles of dust. He stared at the blank pages, intact after having dried out the water, and felt pride swelling inside him. Such pride he couldn’t explain the nature of or why he was feeling it. 

He hadn’t let anyone touch it besides himself; not even Ron and Hermione. Harry had held it in his palms the whole time Hermione examined it, trying out a spell and the magic eraser she had acquired during their last visit to Diagon Alley. His misplaced pride resurfaced when nothing worked, and Hermione begrudgingly admitted that T. M. Riddle must have had incredible magical talents — or had still if he was alive. 

Such revelation had shed some light on things — what Harry thought Nott and Malfoy had managed to work out weeks before they did. 

Harry, Ron and Hermione had been by the window in Gryffindor Tower one day. The diary was hidden inside the layers of Harry’s robes as a precaution. Hermione hadn’t stopped pestering him for another look at it since the day she had been proven wrong; and Ron had been complaining about Harry’s reluctance to get rid of the diary, certain that Nott and Malfoy had just been planning another prank. They had been talking in hushed tones so as not to be overheard when Harry had once more voiced what had been roaming his mind since he noticed that the diary had dried itself back into perfection without any aid from him — or anyone. 

“I wish I knew why someone did try to chuck it.” Harry had said with a pout. “I wouldn’t mind knowing how Riddle got an award for special services to Hogwarts either.”

“Could’ve been anything.” Ron had mumbled from the side, his face scrunched up in concentration as he focused on the two fifth-year boys playing Wizarding Chess near the fireplace. Harry had gritted his teeth at how dismissive his friend’s attitude was; his misplaced pride being replaced by misplaced anger as Ron didn’t recognise the real value of Riddle’s diary. “Maybe he got thirty O.W.L.s or saved a teacher from the giant squid. Maybe he murdered Myrtle;” Ron had added with a snort, “that would’ve done everyone a favour…”

Hermione had snapped her head up as fast as lightning, the Transfiguration book laying on her lap abandoned for the moment. 

“What?” Ron had asked, a mocking glint in his eyes as he finally looked away from the boring chess game. “Finally gave up on trying to best Nott?” 

“That’s not why I study, Ronald. I only want to improve, so —” Hermione had said annoyedly, her shrill voice calling the attention Harry had wanted to avoid. 

“Not now, Hermione.” Harry had hissed quietly, hinting at her to keep her tone low. He then turned glaring back to Ron, his irritation coming out of him in waves as he tried to make Ron understand the seriousness of what they had been trying to do. “Just explain what you think.”

“The Chamber of Secrets was opened fifty years ago, Ron. Malfoy said it before Christmas, remember?” She had tapped the cover of the diary excitedly, and Harry had flushed bright red as he had ripped it away from the reach of her fingers. He hadn’t wanted Hermione touching it. His friend had looked hurt as she continued, her excitement subdued. “Riddle’s diary is exactly fifty years old. I don’t believe for one second that’s a coincidence.”

“The diary is blank, Hermione.” Ron had moaned to the side, rolling his eyes. 

“Oh, wake up, Ronald!” Hermione had hissed at him, voice snappy as she slapped him in the shoulder, making Ron yelp. “We’ve established Riddle must be powerful. I, for one, am sure the diary has magical properties of some sort. And we know the person who opened the Chamber last time was expelled fifty years ago. We know T. M. Riddle got an award for special services to the school also fifty years ago. Well, don’t you think it’s plausible that Riddle got his special award for catching the Heir of Slytherin? If we can figure out how to use it, his diary would probably tell us everything — where the Chamber is, and how to open it, and what sort of creature lives in it. The person who’s behind the attacks this time wouldn’t want that lying around the castle, would they? Hence why they chuck it.”

“That’s… brilliant!” Harry had celebrated. 

“That creates another problem, though.” Ron had spoken tentatively, still rubbing the place where Hermione had hit him. “We have the diary.”

“So?” Hermione had demanded, looking at Ron as if he was stupid. 

“So, the heir may target us next to get it back.” Ron had explained. “And Nott and Malfoy want it, too. They were looking for it specifically in the bathroom, which means they know how to use it. Neither of them might be the heir, but I bet they would join forces to get it back from us.”

No one had said anything anymore, and Harry had understood his friend’s logic, but he still hadn’t wanted to part with the diary. And he still thought himself to be right. 

Harry was sure the attacks had stopped because the diary was gone. And the heir had other priorities than to petrify all the Muggle-Borns roaming the hallways of Hogwarts. And the school being on high alert, as well as the suspicion still on Harry making sure every single step he took was observed by at least a small crowd of scared students, made it harder for the heir to come for him. 

Harry doubted, however, that the heir had entirely given up, and he thought it stupid to restore the old routine. 

On Valentine’s day, Harry woke up tired, his bones heavy due to the late-running Quidditch practice the night before. He hurried to the Great Hall later than usual and, for a second, he was sure his numb brain had walked him through the wrong set of doors. 

The walls were all covered with large, lurid pink flowers. Worse still, heart-shaped confetti were falling from the pale blue ceiling. Harry went over to the Gryffindor table with his eyes wide and his hair itching from the confetti stuck in it; Ron sat looking sickened, while Hermione seemed to have been overcome by hysterical, girlish giggles. 

“What’s going on?” Harry asked them, giving up on eating as he sat down once he noticed his bacon was covered in small, shiny hearts. 

Ron only pointed to the professors’ table, apparently too disgusted to speak. Lockhart, wearing lurid pink robes to match the decoration, was waving for silence. The teachers on either side of him were all stony-faced. From where he sat, Harry could see a muscle going off in professor McGonagall’s cheek as Nott winked at her from the Slytherin table, making his way toward her with a glowing rose in his grip. 

“Happy Valentine’s Day!” Lockhart shouted. “And may I thank the forty-six people who have so far sent me cards! Yes, I have taken the liberty of arranging this little surprise for you all — and it doesn’t end here!”

Lockhart clapped his hands and through the double doors of the Entrance Hall marched a dozen surly-looking dwarfs — dwarfs wearing golden wings and carrying harps.

Lockhart had dressed them to be cupids. 

“My friendly, card-carrying cupids!” Lockhart beamed, and Harry swore Snape was going to throw up. “They will be roving around the school today delivering your valentines! And the fun doesn’t stop here!”

“Please, Hermione, tell me you weren’t one of the forty-six.” Ron moaned as they were leaving the Great Hall for their first lesson, and he started laughing while with a disgusted grimace marring his face when Hermione suddenly became very interested in searching her bag for her schedule and didn’t answer. 

All day long the dwarfs barged into the classrooms to deliver their cards and, in some cases, even packages. Nott received a weird-looking necklace wrapped in bright yellow paper and, to Harry’s surprise, the Slytherin put it on as Malfoy begrudgingly hid the similarly-looking bracelet he received under his sleeve. 

He had to watch all day as Nott received more and more cards, some of which he never bothered to open. Malfoy himself had a small pile sitting by their desk during Transfiguration, and Harry found it a shame that the cards were all written anonymously, and he wouldn’t know which girls were deranged enough to have a crush on those two. 

They were exiting McGonagall’s classroom to take the stairs and go to lunch when a dwarf caught up with Harry; he felt himself flush as Seamus cooed at him, making cat noises in his direction with Dino. He was embarrassed the dwarf did it so publicly when the whole school met at the same stairs to follow the exact same path. But Harry secretly enjoyed it, though. Someone had thought of him. 

“I’ve got a musical message to deliver to ‘Arry Potter in person.” The dwarf said loudly, twanging his harp in a threatening sort of way as people got in his way. 

Musical message? Harry frowned at that. 

To the side, he caught sight of Malfoy and Nott watching from atop the pedestal of an armour, smirks twisting both their lips as Nott’s silver eyes shone the same way they had before he went to his knees and gave McGonagall that flower during breakfast, proclaiming his love for her in a voice so loud everybody heard — and the Transfiguration professor had been rendered speechless as she sputtered at him with a red face. 

Harry then wondered if the two Slytherins hadn’t just planned on playing McGonagall that day. 

“Not here.” Harry snarled at the small dwarf, who grabbed hold of Harry’s bag and pulled him back forcefully. “Let me go!” Harry snarled, tugging.

With a loud ripping noise, Harry’s bag split in two. His books, wand, parchment, and quill spilt onto the floor, and his ink bottle smashed over everything. Harry desperately scrambled around, trying to pick it all up as he heard Nott’s intake of breath — followed by the noise of him and Malfoy jumping back onto the floor and pushing their way through the crowd. 

“What’s all this commotion?” Said the familiar voice of Percy Weasley, coming closer and closer. 

Harry was about to make a run for it when the dwarf seized him by the shoulder, their bodies now levelled in height. 

“Right.” The dwarf said, stepping over Harry’s feet so he wouldn’t move, and took a too-pink envelope from within his dipper. “Here is your singing valentine: 

His eyes are as green as a fresh pickled toad, 

His hair is as dark as a blackboard, 

I wish he was mine, 

He’s really divine, 

The hero who conquered the Dark Lord! 

Harry would have given all his gold in Gringotts to evaporate on the spot as Ginny Weasley’s high-pinched voice echoed for all to hear. Harry tried to play it off, chuckling weakly as some people wiped tears of mirth which had fallen from their eyes. 

Nott was doubled in laughter as Malfoy pushed him forward still, a determined edge to the blond. 

“Oh, Merlin!” Nott was panting between bark-like laughs. “Was that she-Weasley? It was, wasn’t it? Oh, my… Drakey, Potter has a not-so-secret admirer! That’s so ridiculous — mom’ll love to know she’s made a premonition!” 

People laughed louder at what Nott said, and Harry heard Ron growling somewhere close to him.

“Not now, Theo.” Malfoy hissed, pushing the students forcefully out of the way as he came closer and closer to the diary sprawled amid Harry’s supplies on the floor, one of his hands clutching Nott tightly by his robes as he dragged his friend with him as the other boy continued to try and fail to put himself together. 

Harry tried valiantly to laugh along with everyone else, an attempt to mask the desperation resurfacing over the lethal shame threatening to facilitate the work of the heir by petrifying him on the spot. His first step after kicking the dwarf away from him almost took him to the floor with the small creature, his feet still numb from the weight previously resting atop them.

“Off you go, off you go, the bell rang five minutes ago, off to class now.” Percy Weasley was shooing the students, indignantly shouting his Prefect status as he was ignored. 

Glancing over at Malfoy, he saw the blond’s long finger touching the dark cover of the diary, the pristine skin of his hands looking slippery all coated in the ink that had soaked Tom Riddle’s diary. 

“LOCOMOTOR WIBBLY!” Harry’s voice was shrill as he screamed the incantation, hitting the distracted Malfoy in the middle of the blond’s chest. Harry, for the first time, believed McGonagall had not wanted to diminish the allure of magic the year before as she claimed all successful incantations relied on the intention of the wizard casting it. 

Harry had never before attempted to use the Jelly-Legs Jinx he had read about in his book over the summer, yet Malfoy collapsed to the floor as the muscles of his legs faltered, failing to hold him upright. Harry felt perhaps more triumphant than he should as the diary flew from Malfoy’s grasp without Nott realising it, being too preoccupied with catching his friend before he crashed. 

It was a shame Harry was still a second-year, still inexperienced when it came to spells, as the jinx lasted for only a moment. But that moment was enough for Harry to size Riddle’s prized possession to him. 

Harry’s eyes widened as he found himself face-to-face with the tip of Nott’s wand, his arms now free as Malfoy stood next to him with his pointy features contorted into a sneer mirrored by the other Slytherin. 

“You’ll wish I was the heir when I’m done with you, Golden Boy.” Nott hissed. “He’d’ve been kinder to you. Now — give me the bloody diary.”

Harry shook his head dumbly, his hands tightening around his wand as he hugged the diary to him and looked for Ron with his eyes. His friend was yelling for him a few feet away, fighting off a wave of dwarves strutting to the Great Hall. 

“Mr. Nott!” McGonagall's stern voice sounded as she exited her classroom to watch the commotion. She looked dishevelled as she rushed the few first years jumping in front of her, excited to watch what Seamus had started chanting to be a fight. “Five points from Hufflepuff!” She screamed as a third-year boy tackled an armour as he ran past to follow the dwarves. “Mr. Nott, do not test me! — All students return to their activities! — Mr. Finnegan, detention!” She continued to scream, her orders more effective than Percy’s had been, which rendered Ron’s brother glum. “Theo! Pocket your wand this instant! Ten points from Slytherin!”

“Potter started it!” Nott said over the noise of students fleeing the scene as McGonagall continued to deduct points. 

“I’m finishing it.” Percy arrived, then, glaring down at Nott while seizing his wrist, struggling to pry Nott’s fingers from the handle of his wand. He had an air of importance to him, the most pompous Harry could remember so far from Ron's least fun brother, chest puffed to display the Prefect Badge as he stared not at Harry, and no more at Nott, but at the approaching Transfiguration professor as if he expected her to go down on her knees to praise him. 

Harry grimaced at that, finding Ron huffing to the side, but it was as good of an opportunity as any as Nott shouted at Percy to let go of him. Motioning his head for Ron to follow him, Harry collected his ripped bag and supplies from the floor, filling the pockets of his robes with what had fallen, and tiptoed to the end of the corridor as quietly as he could. 

“That’s quite enough, Mr. Weasley —” McGonagall was saying, voice dying as a smacking sound echoed. Many mumbled curses reached Harry’s ears, and he turned back in time to see Percy’s shocked face and McGonagall’s weird frown as Nott smirked. 

Percy already had a bruise forming on the underside of his jaw and, Harry noticed, Nott’s knuckles were reddened as he clenched and unclenched his fingers. 

He had punched Percy. Punched Ron’s brother, a sixth-year Prefect — someone five years his senior. In front of a professor no less. 

“Detention, Mr. Nott.” McGonagall whispered, both eyebrows arched, as if she, too, had not expected it. She spoke slowly as if not yet able to believe what her eyes had shown her. 

“I’m afraid I’m already booked for the month, professor.” Nott drawled lazily, smirk widening as Ginny Weasley’s tiny form appeared from behind a tapestry, trembling from head to toe. “I don’t think Potter liked your valentine too much, Weasellette. He couldn’t bolt from here fast enough.”

“Enough, Theo!” McGonagall exclaimed as Ginny covered her face with her hands and ran into class. Harry was sure he saw tears swelling in her eyes — as had Ron. Harry had to hold him back when his friend snarled, drawing his hooked wand and stumbling on his oversized robes. “You are understandably upset, and I shall give Mr. Potter a piece of my mind for jinxing Mr. Malfoy, but I thought you above such violent bursts of temper.”

“You obviously don’t know me much, then.” Nott hissed, doing what Harry suspected no student has ever dared as he stared McGonagall in the eye. 

The Transfiguration professor sighed, massaging her temples. 

“Maybe.” She whispered faintly. “I’m stripping you of your free hours, Theo. You are to spend them aiding Mr. Filch around the castle. And I expect this to keep you from conjuring snakes in the grounds.”

“Can’t make any promises.” Nott drawled, letting Malfoy drag him away after nodding to McGonagall and sneering at Percy one last time. 

Harry held his breath for another few seconds before shaking his head and resuming walking. He should go to Charms before professor Flitwick warned McGonagall about his skipping classes as well as hexing other students in the hallways. He didn’t think anyone would believe him if he said he had reason to not want Malfoy to have Riddle’s diary. He had no way of explaining that the diary was his and that he felt in his bones an obligation to keep it safe, to keep it by his side. 

And he had no way of explaining that he feared Nott and Malfoy were doing more than mean pranks in Hogwarts. 

He couldn’t concentrate as the class progressed, his mind wondering, lost in his distorted reflex in the glass windows. He wondered what Nott saw in the mirror each morning. Wondered if he, too, found more sense in a wavering image and blurred contours making himself indistinguishable, than in a perfect picture. 

He doubted it, though.  

Professor McGonagall had been so shocked at Nott’s behaviour, almost nostalgic — even if exhaustedly so. Nott had broken records of detention, he had lost Slytherin as many points as he had gained, had insulted every single walking entity inside the castle, and embarrassed McGonagall herself in front of the whole faculty. Yet she had not expected him to act aggressively. Had not expected the Slytherin to have the explosive temper he had displayed. 

She had once proclaimed that having Nott was like repeating the experience of having to teach his mother, though McGonagall had seemed more exasperated than afraid at the mention of Ravenna Nott. She seemed almost displeased to have Nott breaking the pattern, to have him using his fists instead of his tongue, as Harry was sure Lady Nott would have done had it been her needing the diary Harry now had in his possession. 

Harry had almost given it to Nott when the Slytherin asked for it, and the realisation scared him. Tom Riddle — the secrecy of his persona, the powerful simplicity of his diary — had been what refrained him. 

He had called Nott crazy before, had called him mean, and had thought him dangerous. And Harry believed himself to be right. But he had never noticed just how different he and Malfoy actually were. 

Malfoy was subtle. His approach was almost silky, a caress. He had manipulated Myrtle with such easiness Harry had thought the blond was not capable of. Nott was different, though. 

Nott was messier, louder, rawer. His drawl was not sweet, it was not silky, or fancy. It was lazy, mocking, with that nasty grin always on the verge of breaking through. 

It wasn’t until Harry was packing his books after professor Flitwick’s lesson that he noticed something rather odd about the diary he has been guarding. All his other books had been drenched by the spilt scarlet ink. Riddle’s diary, however, was as clean as it had been before the ink bottle had smashed over it. 

Harry turned his head to the side to show it to Ron, but the words did not make it out of his mouth. Similarly to when he spoke Perselmouth — the same automatic urge, coming to him so naturally he had never realised he was speaking hisses instead of words —, his voice stayed lodged in his throat. 

Riddle’s diary was so powerful. It was alive. It should be kept a secret. A beautiful, pulsating secret only Harry should know. 

Harry went to bed before anyone else in his dormitory that night. He both wanted to escape Fred and George publicly humiliating their little sister further by singing “His eyes are as green as a fresh pickled toad”, and because he wanted to examine Riddle’s diary again. Alone. Without prying eyes; without his friend pestering him for obsessing about another useless lead. 

Harry sat on his four-poster bed and flicked through the black pages, not one of which had a trace of scarlet ink on it. Then he pulled a new bottle out of his bedside cabinet, dipped his quill into it, and dropped a blot onto the first page of the diary. 

The ink shone brightly on the paper for a second and then, as though it was being sucked in by the pristine pages, vanished. Excited, Harry loaded up his quill a second time and wrote, ‘My name is Harry Potter’. 

A second later, he couldn’t tell why that had been the information he had chosen to disclose. 

He had once read a book — a Muggle Fairytale he had come across one of the few times his neighbour Miss Figg could not look after him, and his relatives had found themselves forced to take him with them to the mall — in which the main character, a prince, had made the mistake of disclosing his real name to an evil sorcerer. 

A name. All it had taken the sorcerer was a name to make the runaway prince his slave. 

Names held power, and Harry should have known that by now. All it took was him voicing his name for people to gape at him, for conversations to stop, and for people to become awe-struck. All it took was the name Voldemort for grown wizards to bolt, for their faces to pale, and remember that they had some urgent commitment they must attend. 

He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, The Dark Lord, Voldemort, You-Know-Who — words, names, that inspired fear. 

Harry James Potter — a name that meant salvation. There was no need for substance, no need to get to know Harry after Harry Potter was introduced. 

Yet Harry had just announced it to a magic diary. He had wanted to. Wanted the diary to recognise him as an equal, wanted Tom Riddle to know him, and to be as curious as Harry was. He had felt compelled to tell this piece of truth before bothering with greetings. 

The words he had written shone momentarily on the page and they, too, sank without a trace. Then, at last, something happened. 

Oozing back out of the page, in his very own onyx ink, came words Harry had never written, in handwriting neater than his own. 

‘Hello, Harry Potter. My name is Tom Riddle. How did you come by my diary?’

These words, too, faded away, but not before Harry started to scribble back, his heart thundering in his chest, cheeks flaming in excitement as the delicate lines spelling ‘Tom Riddle’ flashed through his mind. 

‘Someone tried to flush it down the toilet, but I was able to recover it before any damage could be done.’

He waited eagerly for Riddle’s reply. 

‘Lucky that I recorded my memories in some more lasting way than ink. But I always knew that there would be those who would not want this diary read.’

Harry felt such immense satisfaction, the same satisfaction clinging to Riddle’s message, exhaling pride as he recalled his fantastic deed. And also exhaling disdain for those who tried and failed to keep the diary out of the way. 

‘Whom do you mean?’ Harry scrawled back, blotting the page in his excitement. 

‘Those who would rather have excellence silenced. I’m glad you are not one of those, Harry.’ His face flushed once more at the praise — at being recognised by Riddle. ‘This diary holds memories of terrible things, Harry Potter. Things that were covered up — things that happened at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.’ 

Harry’s heart thundered inside his chest, the pressure against his ribcage suffocating. 

Fifty years ago the chamber had been opened. Fifty years ago a Muggle-Born had been killed. Fifty years ago Tom Riddle had walked the same corridors as Harry. Fifty years ago Tom Riddle won an award for special services to the school. 

Around fifty years ago those who would rather have excellence silenced had done a cover-up. 

Harry had to physically suppress his excitement as he wrote next, ‘That’s where I am now. I’m at Hogwarts, and horrible stuff’s been happening. Do you know anything about the Chamber of Secrets?’

Riddle’s reply came quickly, his writing becoming a tad untidier, as though he was hurrying to tell all he knew — eager to help Harry; trusting him. 

‘Of course, I know about the Chamber of Secrets. In my day, they told us it was a legend, that it did not exist. But this was a lie, Harry Potter. A lie by the same who does not wish to have this diary out in the light. In my fifth year, the Chamber was opened and the monster within attacked several students, finally killing one. I caught the person who’d opened the Chamber and he was expelled. But the Headmaster, Professor Dippet, ashamed that such a thing had happened at Hogwarts, forbade me to tell the truth. A story was given out that the girl had died in a freak accident. They gave me a nice, shiny, engraved trophy for my trouble and warned me to keep my mouth shut. But I knew it could happen again. The monster lived on, and the one who had the power to release it was not imprisoned. He was allowed privileges he did not deserve, granted the privilege to live on with no punishment, not unlike the monster itself.’

Tom Riddle had been silenced. 

The realisation hit Harry like a punch — the realisation that he was talking to an unknown hero. Riddle had stopped the attacks and turned in the responsible. And the truth had become but a memory stuck in a diary. 

‘It’s happening again now. There have been three attacks and no one seems to know who’s behind them. Who was it last time?’ Harry wrote back quickly. 

Harry relinquished in pleasure as his question soaked into the yellowed page. 

‘I can show you if you like.’ Came Riddle’s reply, his handwriting once more refined. ‘You don’t have to take only my word for it, Harry. I can recognise your intelligence, as well as how unwise it seems to trust one you cannot see. I can take you inside my memory of the night when I caught the responsible, though. I do believe it is safe to trust your own eyes, wouldn’t you agree, Harry?’

Harry swelled. A small part of him did think it unwise. A small part of him was apprehensive, but hadn’t Riddle said he was right to be so? And he had offered an alternative. 

Still, Harry hesitated slightly, his quill suspended over the diary. What did Riddle mean, exactly? How could he be taken inside somebody else’s memory? He glanced nervously at the door to the dormitory, which was growing dark. When he looked back at the diary, he saw fresh words forming. 

Harry was assailed by impatience, then. 

‘Let me show you.’ Riddle wrote beautifully, each letter drawn on the paper. 

Like a caress. 

Harry paused for a fraction of a second and then wrote two letters: OK. 

He was not prepared for what he saw. 

“I think it would do no good to tell anyone.” Harry whispered furiously to Ron as they made their way to the Great Hal. Hermione was walking ahead of them with her nose up in the air, pointedly ignoring them since Ron told her off for wanting to go ask Hagrid himself about the Chamber of Secrets. “I mean, it has been — what? — three, four months since Justin and Nearly Headless Nick were petrified. The Heir has attacked no one since.”

“That’s true.” Ron mumbled. “And I guess it won’t take long before the Mandrakes are ready, right? Professor Sprout was quite happy when mine jumped out of the pot and spilt repellent all over Parvati’s notes.”

“Yeah.” Harry agreed. “She reckons that’s when Mandrakes reach maturity, and now it shouldn’t be long until they can wake up the students in the Hospital Wing.”

Ron made a grunting noise at the back of his throat, the same careful glint clouding his eyes as when he was about to ask Harry to repeat for the thousandth time what Riddle had shown him in the memory. He didn’t know what Hermione and Ron expected would happen if Harry repeated the story enough times. It was not like it would change. It was not like Hagrid would suddenly be found innocent. 

The memory had messed with Harry in more ways than just one. 

He had chocked on his own saliva upon recognising Hagrid’s younger self in the memory, recognising that it had been Hagrid’s name Tom Riddle had called after coming out of his hiding space, where he had been watching a young Hagrid trying to smuggle an enormous, chilling spider out of the castle. 

Harry didn’t think for one second that Hagrid was the Heir of Slytherin. He did not believe his friend capable of killing anyone, let alone an innocent girl. But Harry would be lying if he said he couldn’t see the plausibility of it and see the fairness in Hagrid having been expelled. He could understand Riddle's indignation. 

Hagrid must have discovered the rumours about the monster within the castle, and been unable to help himself. It sounded like the Gamekeeper to inconsequently go after the creature roaming the castle, attempting to pet it, feed it, and take walks with it along the grounds. And it sounded like him to lose control of the monster at some point, unwillingly letting it attack and kill students.        

And then there was Riddle. Tom Riddle had seemed somewhat familiar. His request to stay in Hogwarts during the summer was not unlike wishes Harry didn’t dare voice out loud. 

Turning Hagrid in had been a desperate attempt on his part, beyond notions of rightness. Dead parents, raised in an orphanage knowing only his father’s name and his blood status, knowing his mother was a witch and nothing more. 

It was hell to grow up with the Dursleys, Muggles who despised magic, and in turn, despised Harry for barring it. It must have been so much worst for Riddle, though. Surrounded by people who could not understand him, people who forbade him from sharing what excited him, and who called him a freak for being different. 

But as much as Harry sympathised, he had not written any new messages inside the diary. Not after his reluctance to accuse Hagrid was met with Riddle’s silence — and his silent rage. 

There was something… eery about Tom Riddle. He was so perfect, so respectful. Obviously talented. Irrefutably handsome. When he spoke, Harry thought he had no other option but to listen. When he flushed inside Headmaster’s Dippet office, Harry didn’t think the embarrassment was reflected in his eyes. When he stared at young professor Dumbledore, Harry did not think him polite — or innocent. 

Riddle had an edge to him. Not very unlike Malfoy with his silver tongue. Not very unlike Nott and his confidence. 

“It was never a secret that Hagrid was expelled.” Ron offered miserably. “And I reckon the attacks must’ve stopped after he was kicked out, or Riddle wouldn’t’ve gotten his award. But… I don’t know, Harry. Riddle was right, wasn’t he? The monster is still free, and it clearly is not done attacking.” 

“It has been four months since —”

“And it had been fifty years before the monster escaped again.” Ron said back before Harry could protest. “I don’t think Hagrid knows much about how to keep it locked in. And that doesn’t surprise me one bit. Remember when he wanted to keep the dragon?”

“He gave it away, though.” Harry pointed out, feeling it his duty to defend Hagrid. 

“After Hermione nagged him.” Ron deadpanned. “He’d’ve kept that dragon in his cabin, here in school. And we saw how he was with it — Hagrid had no idea what he should do. His beard caught on fire, didn’t it?”

Harry had no response to that. 

“Let’s just give it more time.” Harry said lamely. “We don’t know if Hagrid’s anything to do with the attacks this time around, anyway. And Dumbledore was there, wasn’t he? He would’ve known to ask Hagrid right away.”

“Guess you’re right.” Ron mumbled, brows still creased. “I just keep thinking — and don’t go off the handle again, Harry — that you met Hagrid in Knockturn Alley when you got lost in the Flu. Only dark wizards go there.”

“He was just buying Flesh-Eating Slug Repellent.” Harry answered quickly. “That’s no big deal.”

“If you say so.” Ron shrugged, though he didn’t look very convinced. 

“I get it, Ron, really.” Harry tried again. “But I think it’s different this time, I can feel it. Malfoy and Nott still want the diary. No doubt they need it as proof of something. We’d only be doing them a favour by telling anyone of Hagrid’s involvement.”

“Guess you’re right about that.” Ron finally admitted as they rounded the corridor to the Great Hall, the distance between them and Hermione considerably shorter now. She had slowed down some time ago, wanting to listen in on their conversation. “Those two are closer than the twins these days — it’s creepy.”

“It’s good that they are too busy lurking around the castle to do much else.” Harry commented.

“I wouldn’t be too sure about that, Harry.” Hermione remarked, gesticulating with a finger as if giving a lecture. “They are clearly planning something. I wouldn’t be surprised if these calm times are just an illusion of safety, so everyone will have their guards down. Nott has already done a fantastic job in turning all suspicions onto you, Harry. This calm before the storm will only make the next attack all the more explosive, and us knowing about Hagrid and saying nothing will only make you look more guilty.”

“Blimey, Hermione, how many times must we tell you?!” Ron groaned frustrated. “Nott is not the heir. You were wrong. Accept it already and move on. A list of victims with Nott’s signature on the bottom will not magically appear on a book no matter how many hours you spend in the library.”

“Excuse me, Ronald, for doing more than moping about the next Quidditch match. The Muggle-Borns in this school are in danger, and if you can’t spare a few seconds of your precious time to worry about them, then…”

“Spare me, Hermione.” Ron hissed, thankfully interrupting the rant before it could go any further. Harry was sure he knew it by heart already. “And stop pretending you’re in some half-arse quest for the greater good of Hogwarts. You’re all just jealous of Nott for being better than you, and you want him to be the heir so he’ll be expelled like Hagrid.” 

Harry face-palmed as Hermione’s brown eyes widened, filling with unshed tears. Harry agreed with Ron, they had discussed that same matter many times in their dorm, tired of Hermione dragging them to the library in search of more proof against Nott, and finding nothing they didn’t already know. But they had also agreed to say nothing to her face, lest they are left with her crying and refusing to help them with their homework. 

Ron didn’t seem much concerned with that, though. He was flushed, chest heaving as he continued to stare down at Hermione, the accumulated anger he has been successfully keeping inside exploding out of him. 

“Nott knows you’re onto him, and he is messing with you.” Ron told her. “All the evidence you think you have against him is what he’s given you. I bet he and Malfoy spend their time laughing at you — and at us — for falling for their act. Excuse me for not wanting to be a joke.”

Fat tears leaked from Hermione’s eyes as she turned her back on them and rushed to the Great Hall, becoming a brown blur in the sea of students lazily making their way in, knowing they had no classes for the duration of the Easter Holidays. 

“That was a bit too harsh, Ron.” Harry commented tiredly as he resumed walking. 

“Whatever. This'll get her out of our hair for some time.” Ron shrugged, rolling his eyes. “I promise I’ll apologise before dinner, and tomorrow she will be back to nagging us to read more articles detailing Nott’s mother's new line of fancy underpants.” 

Harry grimaced at that, his guilt diminishing upon remembering how torturous it was to sit in the library, with Madam Pince hovering over his shoulder while he found out that the most notorious thing Lady Nott had done since being released from Azkaban was to become a famous fashion designer, whose clothes were sold at a price so high, her creations were only worn by the aristocracy of the Wizarding World — wizards and witches who apparently did not care that the one confecting their robes had once stood behind bars.

As they sat side by side at the Gryffindor table, though, Harry found a piece of parchment atop his plate. There was a list of all the elective subjects of the following year, the instructions detailing that every second-year student must choose a minimum of two — those which they would study until their fifth year obligatorily. Looking around him, Harry saw Ernie Macmillan at the Hufflepuff table crossing all the options available with a stressed-out look on his face. 

Seeing Harry’s horror, Percy scutched closer on the bench, bending forwards to speak closer to Harry’s ear. For once, Harry was glad for Percy’s presence. 

“You may choose all of them if you want, Harry.” Percy explained. “And if you happen not to be apt to some of them, you may drop out of them as long as you fulfil the requirement of two.”

“Right.” Harry said; his brain swimming. Not far away from him, Seamus' parchment caught on fire, and Lavender Brown spilt water over it with a shriek, already done with her own. “Thanks.”

“It depends where you want to go, Harry.” Percy continued to speak quietly, sensing how lost Harry was feeling. He hadn’t known he would be able to choose which subjects he wanted. Had never even contemplated that there were more than the core classes he has had since the year before. It had been rather silly of him — there were too many teachers occupying the professors’ table for only seven subjects to be taught in school. “It’s never too early to think about the future, you know. Experiment which areas are fit for you. Personally, I’d recommend Divination — it might grant you some insight, see? People usually cast Muggle Studies out as a soft option, but it is useful knowledge depending on the career you want to pursue — look at my father, for example, he has to deal with Muggle businesses all the time. But I guess you can always pick an Extracurricular Curse if your interest is superficial. My brother Charlie was always more of an outdoor type — loves all creatures, see, dragons especially —, so he went for Care of Magical Creatures. My other brother Bill has always wanted to be Curse Breaker, so he chose Arithmancy, Ancient Runes, and Care of Magical Creatures. In his sixth year, he dropped out of History of Magic and started taking Alchemy, too. It’s a shame this particular course needs a certain demand to be included in the curriculum. I never had the option…” Percy lamented. “Anyway, you should play to your strengths, Harry. You should be alright if you do that. And you shouldn’t aspire for the minimum, like Fred and George. Sometimes having less free time in school than your lazier peers pays off in the future, I assure you.” 

Harry nodded, turning around his parchment. 

If having to choose among Divination, Muggle Studies, Arithmancy, Study of Ancient Runes, and Care of Magical Creatures wasn’t enough, several Extracurricular Subjects were listed on the back. The instructions made it clear those were not mandatory, very like the clubs Harry had never been able to participate in his Muggle school. No one seemed to be very interested in them, but Percy’s words rung in Harry’s mind. 

Perhaps it would indeed pay off to deepen what he knew — or just to know something at all. But he didn’t think any of the options were very appealing, apart perhaps from Apparition and Flying, but it was written that only students of age could learn how to apparate, and Harry was already part of the Quidditch Team. 

That left him with Ancient Studies (which sounded just as boring as History of Magic), Art (which would be a waste of his time), Ghoul Studies (which left him feeling nauseated), Magical Theory (which already brought tears of boredom to his eyes), Muggle Art (which Harry despised after all those afternoons spend under the doubtful care of Miss Figg watching museum specials on her television), Muggle Music (which did not interest him in the slightest), Music (which wasn’t much different), and Xylomancy (which Harry had no idea what it was). 

In front of him, Neville Longbottom seemed just as confused as Harry. His roommate had been sent letters from all the witches and wizards in his family, all giving him different advice on what to choose. Neville’s tongue was poking out of his mouth as he clumsily asked Alicia Spinnet if she thought Arithmancy was more difficult than Ancient Runes. Hermione, still sporting red-rimmed eyes and wet cheeks, was staring notoriously down, not listening to anyone. 

“Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God…” Hermione was mumbling under her breath. “This will affect my entire future… I must make the right decision… my future in the Wizarding World depends on this…”

“A tad dramatic, isn’t she?” Ron asked with his mouth full of eggs. The edges of his parchment had jelly stains on them. “Fred and George said we can start caring in fifth year. It’s when things get serious — with O.W.L.S and career orientation —”

“You shouldn’t listen to them, Ron.” Percy chastised. “Fred and George are the examples of what not to do.”

“You are the example of what not to do.” Ron said under his breath, his face half hidden behind a class of pumpkin juice. He had an orange moustache coating his upper lip as he bumped his shoulder into Harry’s. “Already know what you want?”

Harry shook his head, “What I really want is to give up Potions.” 

“We can’t.” Ron told him grimily. “We have to keep all our old subjects ‘till sixth year — or so Bill tells me. Shame, though, I would love to ditch Defence Against the Dark Arts.”

Harry just nodded, eyebrows arching as he watched Hermione select every single option on her parchment, both Electives and Extracurriculars. He didn’t know how she would manage, and he hoped she wouldn’t be too proud to drop out before school became an even bigger burden. He was about to say something to her, test the waters, when Lockhart’s chair fell back as he got up, his hands covering his mouth and eyes wide in alarm. When he tried to speak, only barks came out, and the blond professor left the Great Hall with a strained smile. 

Harry didn’t laugh as the others around him, not when it was obvious to him who had been responsible. Theo Nott was banging his fists on the Slytherin table as he laughed louder than everyone else, Malfoy imitating Lockhart’s expression next to him. 

“Merlin, he is so stupid!” Nott was saying. “I couldn’t have made the switch more obvious, and the fool still drank the whole thing!” 

“Don’t know what you’re expecting.” Zabini said smugly. “Lockhart can’t tell the right end of his wand.” 

“You would think he would realise his water was purple and bubbling, though.” Malfoy added amid chuckles, his smile subsiding as McGonagall tapped her feet on the ground behind them. 

Zabini averted his eyes immediately, all students quieting down at the scowl marrying their Transfiguration professor’s face. All but Nott, who continued grinning as he brushed his hair away from his face, turning sideways on the bench and mockingly bowing to McGonagall. 

“Morning, Minerva.” He drawled, unaffected by the vein protruding from said professor’s forehead. “I must say, you look very dashing this morning. The holidays have done wonders to your skin.” 

“Done with the flattery, Mr. Nott?” McGonagall asked stiffly, but Harry swore her mouth was curling slightly on the side. 

“That depends.” Nott declared bluntly, his grin widening. “Did it work? I would hate to lose more than twenty points.”

“You find yourself in luck, Mr. Nott. This particular stunt happens to be rather ingenious — and, more importantly, harmless.”

“Just for you, Minerva.” Nott batted his long lashes at her, making Malfoy choke on his drink. 

“Fifteen points from Slytherin.” McGonagall declared finally. 

“Fair enough.”

Harry thought McGonagall would then collect her skirts and go back to her table atop the small pedestal on the other end of the long hall, but she stayed put, eyeing Nott’s parchment critically. 

“Divination, Theo?” She asked Nott. “I recall your mother being rather disdainful towards this particular subject, was she not?”

Nott smirked, “Totally.” He drawled. “But I was told the professor is nutters. Drakey and I thought it would be a great use of our time.” 

McGonagall massaged her temples as Malfoy hissed at Nott to shut up under his breath, but the dark-haired Slytherin continued to grin mischievously, winking as the Transfiguration professor turned exasperated eyes to him. 

“Of course you did.” She remarked dryly. “What other subjects have you chosen?” 

“Care of Magical Creatures, Arithmancy and Ancient Runes.” Nott shrugged, completely unconcerned. “Mom reckons Muggle Studies was a big waste of her time when she took it. Not very preparatory — or so she says.”

“Yes, she did make her displeasure quite clear.” McGonagall’s lips were crisped as she said it, scowling as Nott’s amusement grew. “A shame her pride did not allow her to drop out when she was given the option. Godric knows it would have made the lives of all of us easier.” She mumbled as in an afterthought. “Any Extracurricular Activities I shall have security measures installed against you, Theo?”

“Of course.” Nott beamed, displaying his parchment. Enjoying how the Great Hall had stopped to watch him. “I reckon Art, Magical Theory and Flying are in for a treat next year.”

McGonagall arched an eyebrow at him, “Art, you say?” She asked. “Am I do understand you share your mother’s talents in this area?”

“Some.” Nott shrugged again, grinning wickedly. Promising trouble. 

“I shall look forward to punishing you next year, then.” Professor McGonagall deadpanned. “Have a nice day, Theo.”

“You too, Minerva.” Nott answered her cheekily, blowing her a kiss that had the Professor waving her hands in the air as if to slap it away from her. 

Nott was still laughing at Malfoy’s displeased face when Oliver Wood elbowed Percy away from Harry and dropped the new training schedule on his plate, warning him not to dare be late. Their chances of winning the Cup were good after their win against Slytherin, and training has been coming about better than before Christmas — or, at least, they were considerably drier than before. 

Noticing Wood had booked the pitch for three hours before lunch, Harry chose the same two subjects Ron had marked on his own parchment, feeling that if he ended up being lousy at them, at least he’d have someone friendly to help him, and put up with Nott by his side. He then led the way back to Gryffindor Tower, dreading the stress he was about to endure. 

Gryffindor's next Quidditch match would be against Hufflepuff and, since the beginning of Easter Break, Harry thought Wood’s nagging had paid off. He had caught the Snitch in less than an hour every single practice, no more Bludgers tried to kill him, and their three Chasers had finally managed to pull the move Wood had wanted them to pull since they played Slytherin at the beginning of the year. 

Harry barely had time for anything else besides Quidditch and homework, debates over Hagrid, though. The matter of Theo Nott had fallen to the background of his mind on its own accord. Today was the evening before Saturday’s match, and Harry was feeling rather positive as he went up to his dormitory to drop off his broomstick. 

With the exception of the Slytherins, the whole Hogwarts seemed to think that Gryffindor's chances of winning were higher — even the Hufflepuffs themselves. It filled Harry with the urge not to disappoint them. 

But his cheerful mood didn’t last long. At the top of the stairs to the second- year’s dormitories, he met a frantic-looking Neville, who seemed reluctant as he pushed the door open. 

“Harry — I swear I don’t know who did it — I just found —” his roommate was stuttering. 

The contents of Harry’s truck had been thrown everywhere. His cloak lay ripped on the floor. The bedclothes had been pulled off his four-poster and the drawer had been pulled out of his bedside cabinet, the contents strew over the mattress. 

Harry walked over to the bed, open-mouthed, treading on a few loose pages of Travels with Trolls. As he and Neville pulled the blankets back onto his bed, Ron, Dean, and Seamus came in. Dean swore loudly. 

“What happened, Harry?” He asked. 

“No idea.” Harry answered, noticing Ron examining his robes, frowning at the pockets hanging out. 

“Someone’s been looking for something.” Ron remarked seriously, eyeing Harry with an arched eyebrow. “Is there anything missing, Harry?”

Harry looked around, throwing his books back onto his truck, scowling at Lockhart’s smiling face in the cover of most of them, when he felt his chest emptying. Like a void. 

“Riddle’s diary is gone.” He whispered to Ron, glad that the other three were too busy trying to tidy his mattress for him. 

“Blimey!” Ron exclaimed loudly. “It was them, Harry! It has to have been Nott and Malfoy!” 

“Nott and Malfoy?” Dean asked confusedly. “Why would they want to go through Harry’s stuff, anyway?”

“Yeah, it doesn’t sound like them at all.” Seamus agreed. “Nott’d rather trip you and rob you in front of everyone, mate.” 

Harry nodded, “It was a Gryffindor.” He said seriously. “No other student knows the password, and I doubt the Fat Lady would grant passage to two Slytherins.” 

“Should we tell McGonagall?” Neville asked fearfully, but Harry shook his head. 

“No, it’s fine. Nothing was taken.” He looked pointedly at Ron. “Must have been someone’s idea of a prank.” 

They shrugged, and Harry only told Ron he would be talking to Hermione about it when she came back from the library. Ron said nothing, apparently just as relieved as he was unnerved to have the diary gone from their hands. 

Harry shook his head. He had to focus on Quidditch right now. Tomorrow — tomorrow he would worry about whom Malfoy had been able to manipulate into stealing Tom Riddle’s knowledge from him. 

He woke up the next day to brilliant sunshine and a light, freezing breeze. 

“Perfect Quidditch conditions!” Wood said enthusiastically at the Gryffindor table, loading every team member’s plate with scrambled eggs. The smile on his face sent a chill up Harry’s spine. 

As he left the Great Hall with Ron to go collect his Quidditch things, another very serious worry was added to Harry’s growing list. He had just set foot on the marble staircase when he heard it yet again. 

Kill this time… let me rip… tear…  

He shouted aloud and Ron jumped away from him in alarm. 

“The voice!” Harry gasped, looking over his shoulder. And finding nothing. “Ron, I hear the voice again! It’s going to kill someone this time!”

“Oh, my Merlin. Are you sure?” Harry stared at his friend with a look of incredulity on his face, not believing Ron would even ask him that. Ron went pale. “Harry…” Ron whispered fearfully, “have you seen Hermione at all today?” 

“I-I… no… I haven’t.” Harry said. “She stormed out of the Common Room in the morning when I told her about the diary — and that I wouldn’t be reporting it missing to any professor. She said she would be in the library in case I came to my senses.”

“You don’t think… I mean… you don’t think she is in… danger — do you?” 

“I-I don’t…” Harry started to say, but he was sent crashing into the wall when a pissed Oliver Wood walked passed him, his grin nowhere to be seen. 

“What —?” Ron began, but then Professor McGonagall’s voice sounded in the corridor as if she was beside them. 

“The match has been cancelled.” She spoke shakily. “All students are to make their way back to their House Common Rooms, where their Head of House will give them further information. As quickly as you can, please!” She stopped, repeating it two more times until she took a rather audible deep breath. “Mr. Potter and Mr. Weasley, you are expected on the Hospital Wing.”

Harry and Ron exchanged a glance, their throats constricted as they silently retreated back the way they had come from. 

Chapter Text

Previous Chapter 

Kill this time… let me rip… tear…  

He shouted aloud and Ron jumped away from him in alarm. 

“The voice!” Harry gasped, looking over his shoulder. And finding nothing. “Ron, I hear the voice again! It’s going to kill someone this time!”

“Oh, my Merlin. Are you sure?” Harry stared at his friend with a look of incredulity on his face, not believing Ron would even ask him that. Ron went pale. “Harry…” Ron whispered fearfully, “have you seen Hermione at all today?” 

“I-I… no… I haven’t.” Harry said. “She stormed out of the Common Room in the morning when I told her about the diary — and that I wouldn’t be reporting it missing to any professor. She said she would be in the library in case I came to my senses.”

“You don’t think… I mean… you don’t think she is in… danger — do you?” 

“I-I don’t…” Harry started to say, but he was sent crashing into the wall when a pissed Oliver Wood walked passed him, his grin nowhere to be seen. 

“What —?” Ron began, but then Professor McGonagall’s voice sounded in the corridor as if she was beside them. 

“The match has been cancelled.” She spoke shakily. “All students are to make their way back to their House Common Rooms, where their Head of House will give them further information. As quickly as you can, please!” She stopped, repeating it two more times until she took a rather audible deep breath. “Mr. Potter and Mr. Weasley, you are expected on the Hospital Wing.”

Harry and Ron exchanged a glance, their throats constricted as they silently retreated back the way they had come from. 

Hermione's POV

Hermione Granger knew she was smarter than the average student. Her parents have always told her that her best quality was her curiosity, which combined with how keen she was to learn drew her a bright future. Her teachers have always praised her intelligence, and always complimented her for her scores, her advanced skills and eloquence when she was but a child. She had once had a teacher tell her that she was the brightest pupil he has ever taught in his career.

Hermione knew best, and she was rarely wrong about anything. With how logical she was, it was hard to ever be wrong.

She just wished Harry and Ronald could see the facts as easily as she. How many times must she tell them that Theo Nott is the Heir of Slytherin? How many times must she provide them with proof? She was tired of being ridiculed by them, and tired of having them mocking her when she was doing what no one else could.

Theo Nott had the means, he had the reasons, the capacity, and the evilness necessary to want Muggle-Borns like herself out of his way. He had said so himself, hadn’t he? He had called her a fluke as he declared openly that he would rather frequent a school where his kind was the only one allowed entrance. His parroting the ideals of Salazar Slytherin should have been more than enough for him to be expelled from school. But he had all of them fooled.

Nott hid behind his cheap tricks, and he diverted attention by putting himself in the spotlight. It was rather brilliant, but Hermione knew better. She could see through him.

The books held the answers to all their questions. All one had to do was look for them.

Finally, alone in the library, finally grateful for Quidditch overwhelming the general common sense of all, Hermione sat in the same corner where she had stashed The Pure-Blood Directory and all her notes. Today would be the day she took it all directly to Headmaster Dumbledore, and she would also be telling him about the break-in in her Common Room.

No doubt the headmaster would see reason in the way Harry’s and Ronald’s still childish brains had failed to.

It had been no Gryffindor who had stolen Tom Riddle’s diary, but Nott — the Heir of Slytherin. By reading Hogwarts — a story, Hermione discovered that it had been no simple spells used to build Hogwarts in the times of the Witch Persecution. The four founders had combined their essence and poured it into the castle. They made it live through their own vital force. They made Hogwarts the safest refuge, as it had a magical core of itself – said core which could only be wielded by the ones who created it.

Only blood of the founders could wield the castle. And Nott had Slytherin’s blood running hot through his veins, as had his mother. Harry had been wrong to assume Nott would have no way to enter the Gryffindor Common Room.

Theo Nott could bend the castle to his will with the same ease he could control the monster within the Chamber of Secrets. No portrait and no password would have been able to deter him. And what better way to keep suspicions away from him than to have seemingly done the impossible? All Nott wanted was for them to suspect a fellow Gryffindor, but Hermione would not fall for his tricks as Harry had, as someone as brilliant as Professor McGonagall had.

She couldn’t understand why the Transfiguration Professor could not agree with her. Hermione had approached her more than once, and she had requested a formal audience with her Head of House to speak of Nott’s prejudice, to recall how awful Ravenna Nott had been in Diagon Alley. Yet the professor had not seen her point but suggested to her to forget about Nott, and not to dwell on his parents, lest she came across something she would wish she hadn’t.

That had been the confirmation Hermione needed to know that Ravenna Nott was not as innocent as the Daily Prophet claimed she was. And Hermione would prove that, too.

She had asked her mother to send her all the magazines whose covers displayed a young Ravenna Yaxley modelling Muggle brands. The flood of correspondence ended a mere week before Harry’s parents were murdered by the hands of You-Know-Who. Ravenna had been advertised to model lingerie in the upcoming weeks, though Hermione’s own mother had embarrassingly lamented the fact that the other woman never showed.

Nott and his mother were not different. They were the same. Ravenna Yaxley, too, had hidden herself in the spotlight while she carried the mission of extinguishing the world of Muggles — following both You-Know-Who and Salazar Slytherin as she did so. 

Hermione collected all she needed and stepped out of the alcove she had claimed as hers, stopping dead in her tracks when voices disturbed the silence, she had been basking in.

“This is useless, Theo.” Malfoy was hissing quietly, and Hermione felt fear grip her gut at the violence with which the blond slammed the book he had in his hands on the table. “What good does it do to know what the monster is when the diary is still with Potter?”

Hermione almost dropped what she was holding, her breath catching as she made sense of Malfoy’s words.

But… why would he think the diary was still with Harry when his own friend had stolen it?

Unless Nott had not even confided in him and was acting on his own.

“It does a butt load of good, Drakey.” Nott drawled; his tone gentler than Hermione thought him capable of. “We know what we’re dealing with now. And besides — it’s just a diary. Who cares if Potter has it?”

“The diary is important, Theo.” Malfoy whispered, so quietly that Hermione almost didn’t hear him. “It’s the key to this whole mess.”

“Drakey —”

“No, Theo, listen!” Malfoy insisted. “I’ve told you — I’ve seen that diary before. It used to be in my father’s study, behind a glass. I remember him gloating to Pansy’s father years ago.”

“You don’t think…” Nott started, and Hermione wished one of them would finish a thought.

“I can only guess.” Malfoy interrupted. “It would make sense, wouldn’t it? The diary disappeared the day father took me to Diagon Alley, but he did not mention it to Mr. Burke. But why else would he want to rid the house of it?”

“He didn’t want the Ministry to find it during the raids.” Nott concluded. “So he knew it has dark magic.”

“Exactly.” Malfoy said. “It’s no coincidence the Chamber’s been opened this year.”

Hermione felt tears swelling in her eyes. Nott had to be lying. This must be a show so Malfoy wouldn’t know he had Tom Riddle’s diary, perhaps inside his pockets at that exact moment. But, deep down, Hermione knew Nott to be genuine. Both of them.

And they were one step ahead of her.

But how could she have known what they did? She was no Pureblood. She couldn’t have been privy to Lucius Malfoy being the owner of the diary without someone confiding in her with the information. They knowing did not attest to their intelligence — nor her lack thereof. It only attested to the advantage they had in the Wizarding World.

Yes. It only attested to their advantage. If anything, it undermined them. Hermione had had no advantage and she was still at the top of the year.

Yes. Yes, she was right. Nott was wrong. His advantage was merely a privilege, not blood. Not his blood.

“Still, Drakey,” Nott said after a moment, “knowing the monster is a Basilisk is progress.”

Hermione frowned. What even was a Basilisk? Maybe she would have known if Care of Magical Creatures wasn’t still a year away, or if she had been raised in a magic household. There was the disadvantage once again. Instead of allowing Nott to simply skip a year — against all the rulers of Hogwarts — they should integrate those differentiated Muggle-Borns with a natural talent for magic such as herself earlier. Had she not fruitlessly attended Muggle schools for useless years— where she had never been appropriately appreciated for her mind — she could have found out about this creature herself. Much sooner than Nott, who had had all the privileges and still been this incompetent.

“We can’t tell the professors, Theo.” Malfoy said, and Hermione would have hexed him for it had she not known she would be facing two with no backup. “They’d have to notify our parents, and father’ll kill me if he finds out I have anything to do with Dumbledore knowing of his involvement.”

“My mom can —”

“She already told you to leave it alone and keep your head down.” Malfoy cut him off again. “Your father will transfer you to another school if you disobey them again.”

Another school? Hermione never knew there were other Wizarding schools available for her to choose from. Perhaps one where there wasn’t so much prejudice, or where her competence would be better recognised. She would have to ask Professor McGonagall about that. And maybe Mrs. Weasley could aid her with a possible transfer, as she doubted her parents would be of any help being clueless Muggles.

Nott tapped his fingers on the table, “Dad is on the board of Governors, though.” He said. “If we tell him about the Basilisk, he can go over Dumbledore easily enough.”

“That’s still too risky.” Malfoy remarked. “Your dad is still under Ministry’s scrutiny because of those raids Dumbledore had passed.”

Hermione silently gasped again. She had told them! She had told Harry and Ron and they hadn't believed her! Lord Nott was afraid, indeed! He knew Headmaster Dumbledore held more power than him than his previous master and his wife! And Malfoy had just confirmed it.

“Well…” Nott drawled, “as much as I hate it, we could tip off Potter. Golden Boy has been ‘investigating’” Nott said the last word mockingly, “since the beginning, hasn’t he? And Granger will never let him give away credit if not to her. Our involvement will never be known.”

“You’re too right about that. Mudblood Granger would rather give up the little magic she has than admit we bested her. It’s our safest option.” Malfoy declared with finality. “Should we ambush Potter, then? I reckon he will be better to speak to on his own than with his ginger sidekick.”

“Ew,” Nott complained, “I’d rather waltz with a troll than to have to actually speak with Potter. No — we should send him an anonymous letter. He is dumb enough to read it. And I bet he will think it came from that giant oaf he hangs with, anyway.”

“Good idea.” Malfoy said. “Should we tell him everything, then? I don’t think he needs to know that we found out about Granger’s run-in with Polyjuice gone wrong. It’ll spoil the fun for when Snape puts the ends together.”

Hermione sputtered. How could they know? And did they know about Harry and Ron interrogating them? Had Nott told his murderer mother about it? God, Hermione would have to come clean to a professor for protection, it was the only option.

“We can leave this bit out.” Nott remarked amusedly. “We should just tell him about the thing with Myrtle since she was the Muggle-Born killed fifty years ago.”

“I’ve been thinking about that actually. Why would the Heir want to target Myrtle? I bet there were more irritating Mudbloods than a first-year girl.” Malfoy said.

“Unless she had been a convenient target.” Nott concluded. “If I wanted to kill someone, I would make it so it would be easy to escape after.”

“Exactly.” Malfoy said. “And a Basilisk is huge. It would do no good to have it out in the open for too long.”

“So the entrance to the Chamber must have been near.”

“No, Theo.” Malfoy said. “The entrance to the Chamber must have been there. In the girl’s bathroom.”

“And the only way for an inspection to have missed it is if only the Heir could open the Chamber.” Nott sounded awed as he spoke, his tone not nearly as terrified — not nearly as bothered — as it should have been for him to be discussing such matters. Murder. “A Parselmouth. The Heir must be a Parselmouth to control the Basilisk and to open the Chamber.”

“Meaning that only Potter can open it.” Malfoy finished. “We write this in the letter and pray that the idiot won’t try to open the Chamber by himself. The last thing we need is for Wonder Boy to be eaten before he can talk to the Professors.”

“Though I wouldn’t be bothered if it happens.” Nott mumbled, and Hermione’s hands clenched into fists as Malfoy’s low chuckles reached her ears.

Hermione was sure there was a reason why the students were selected into Houses, and it was not to provide them with a sense of identity or to provide them with a home, a family, for all the months they were to stay away.

The Sorting Hat must be the most intricate piece of magic since Rowena’s Diadem. Created by the founders themselves, it was a piece of cloth made into an entity capable of thought, capable of speech — and capable of delving into the minds of those who wore it, translating secrets and reading futures.

Hermione did not believe in coincidence. No logical mind did. So, the founders themselves must have known that some wizards were born with a tendency to turn dark, and were already touched by the lurking presence of cruelty, of evilness, at the fragile age of eleven. And the Slytherin House became the vessel to those who could not be helped — to those who lacked wisdom, lacked loyalty and courage, and lacked kindness.

It was no coincidence that every wizard turned dark had been a snake when young. It was no coincidence those wizards and witches had spent their youth at Hogwarts confined to the dungeons, familiarising themselves with the ambient they would undoubtedly end up in.

Headmaster Dumbledore knew to be aware of the students sorted into Slytherin. All the professors must know to keep an eye out for them. To be careful, and provide protection against their antics.

Theo Nott and Draco Malfoy were living proof of that. The spawns of dark parents. The embodiment of Slytherin’s ideals. Regardless of how they were raised, Hermione knew their personalities would always remain unchanging. They would always be cruel, always be rotten to their cores.

Talking about the murdering of another boy their age as if it was a blessing — hoping for it even. Their morality was so twisted, their brains so faulty to the most basic of emotions, that they enabled themselves to disregard the lives of those they considered inferior. They were not investigating out of their goodness. They did not want the attacks to stop because the eradication of Muggle-Borns was inhuman. Nott and Malfoy simply did not want their murderous fathers to be in more trouble when someone inevitably discovered their involvement. They did not want Nott to move away to another school.

Hermione had not been wrong to accuse them. Her suspicions had been logical. She had followed the thread of their actions and of their wicked patterns. She could still turn them in to Headmaster Dumbledore and have Nott expelled.

They might not be the prime perpetrators, but they were still just as guilty as the Heir.

“Too true, that.” Malfoy drawled. “If only the Dark Lord hadn’t missed.”

“I still wonder if he was any good at all.” Nott complains, not even hesitating before ripping the page he had been reading from the book. Not caring that he had just destroyed Hogwarts’ property. Not caring that, because of him, some unaware student might borrow the book and be in serious trouble after Madam Pince inspected it upon returning. “I don’t understand why everyone is so afraid of him. Even my mom.”

“I didn’t think she would be afraid of anything.” Malfoy commented as they started walking, stirring Nott away from the walls hurriedly. “Watch it, Theo! The Basilisk can be sliding through those pipes this second!”

“As if that giant worm would want anything with us. Our blood is pure, Drakey. We are not on the heir’s black list.”

“Theoretically.” Malfoy emphasised, and Hermione frowned. “You said so yourself — your mother is afraid of the Dark Lord. And we both know that the only thing that could ever terrify Ravenna Yaxley has to do with you.”

“Whatever.” Nott mumbled but, as she strained her neck over the corner of her alcove, Hermione noticed that he was doing as Malfoy said, wand secured in his grasp. “Even if we are right, the Dark Lord is gone. Dad said there is no way he can come back. And even if he does, he will go directly to Potter, anyway.”

“We can only hope that he won’t miss the second time…” Malfoy said nastily, their footsteps now mere echoes in Hermione’s ears as she reached a trembling hand to the shelf housing the thick book on creatures Nott had stashed back carelessly.

Hermione shivered as she read the title of the tome she had in her hands.

Most Macabre Monstrosities.

Paranoia was starting to get to her. She must get a grip of herself! She must resort to that which Nott cannot steal from her — her logic. She must think logically!

Her brain was not obeying her.

With sweaty hands, Hermione seemed incapable of opening the book, afraid of what she would find — afraid that the heir would sniffle her getting closer, would sniffle her intention and her capacity to end his schemes. In her, the heir would find no ally, and he must know that. The Basilisk would come for her. Her blood offered her no protection — it made her into the perfect prey.

And for a magical creature to be able to discern magical bearers by their taste — God, maybe there really was an undeniable, unchangeable difference.

Hermione swallowed dry, convincing herself that it was nothing but paranoia that made a screeching sound startle her — as if a large weight was threatening to turn old metal pipes to crumple.

This is Nott and Malfoy messing with her head. Nothing more than two evil, nasty Slytherins messing with her head so she won’t unmask them. She has nothing to fear.

Breathing heavily, Hermione found the fresh rip on the ancient book, her heart breaking at the uncleanliness Nott’s rash actions left behind, scarring paper so thin, Hermione knew the tome had not been written in this century, or the last.

The next page was the 317, meaning that the information she needed was on the missing 316.

Her eyes roamed the remaining books on the shelves above her with something akin to desperation, her mouth involuntarily chatting prayers that she would find yet another old leather column, stained by bronze letters almost completely erased by time.

A whine of relief escaped past her lips as she found a second copy and dropped it into the long table she was leaning against. As Hermione got to page 316, she gasped at the drawing of a giant snake in the middle of the page.

“Of the many fearsome beasts and monsters that roam our land, there is none more curious or more deadly than the Basilisk, known also as the King of Serpents. This snake, which may reach gigantic size, and live many hundreds of years, is born from a chicken's egg, hatched beneath a toad. Its methods of killing are most wondrous, for aside from its deadly and venomous fangs, the Basilisk has a murderous stare, and all who are fixed with the beam of its eyes shall suffer instant death. Spiders flee before the Basilisk, for it is their mortal enemy, and the Basilisk flees only from the crowing of the rooster, which is fatal to it.”

Oh God, oh God, oh God, oh God…!

How long has it been since Malfoy and Nott have been suspecting? How could Harry have been so blind as not to tell her that there was more to that encounter than the two Slytherins trying to antagonise Hagrid?! They had the dead roosters on their hands! She could have gotten to the answer faster had she known where she was supposed to look for it!

Harry had found Nott and Malfoy with a dead rooster. They had found the dead rooster on the grounds, and they had known to be suspicious. The roasters hadn’t only been dead, they had been murdered. Murdered by the heir!

God, Harry could be so clueless!

And the death stare… how come no one has died still? If the Basilisk was on the loose, then there was bound to have been at least someone dead by now, but all the victims of the heir had been petrified. Maybe Nott had been wrong. Maybe he had jumped to conclusions while trying to best her in another useless effort to placate the student body into thinking him the greatest thing after Merlin.

But… but Hermione had to admit that, for as much as Nott had proved himself to be impulsive, he was through. She had seen it. She had seen both Slytherins doing research and slumped over their books during classes in the rare moments when they actually paid the professors any respect.

If Nott of all people could figure it out, then so could she. There must be an explanation for the petrifications, something logical that Hermione’s stress — stress Nott had caused! — was preventing her from seeing.

As Hermione looked to the side, to where Malfoy had been leaning, she found a piece of glass reflecting the sunlight coming through gaps in the shelves. A piece of glass too neatly cut to have been simply broken and forgotten.

Malfoy had left it there, perhaps accidentally as he and Nott became distracted discussing their happiness over Harry’s potential assassination.

Hermione knew the blond to be vain. She had scoffed countless times at his slicked-back hair, at how flawless his skin was even as he aged and the rest of their year developed acne in the most unfortunate of places. Still, she didn’t think Malfoy would risk emasculating himself by walking around with a mirror when his best friend was Nott — someone who certainly would mock him endlessly for it.

There was no reason why Malfoy would need to constantly check his reflex. No reason… unless.

Reflection.

Reflection was the answer. None had stared the Basilisk in the eye, but at its reflection. Water, a ghost, a camera… all the petrified had had some kind of mirroring surface when they were attacked. Something which had spared their life.

Malfoy was not as confident as Nott made it sound. He was scared. He had found a way to protect himself from the lethal eyes of the Basilisk by sticking with a mirror and walking the furthest away from the walls, lest the giant snake got out of a pipe and attacked him.

It was admittedly ingenious — and Hermione hated it. At least, she thought, it had taken her no time at all to figure Nott and Malfoy out. It had taken the two Slytherins months to get to a conclusion and, when they finally did, they were both too much of cowards to do something about it.

Hermione was different. She had pulled at the threads and figured them out. And she was going to do something about it. She would save everyone in those hallways, and prove to McGonagall that Nott was no more exceptional than she was — a Muggle-Born surpassing all the Pure-Bloods of Hogwarts despite their endless attempts to leave her at a disadvantage.

She would go to Professor McGonagall’s office on the first floor that instant, before the whole school forgot common sense in favour of a stupidity such as Quidditch. Bitterly following Malfoy’s warning words to Nott, Hermione walked in the very middle of the corridor leading to the staircases to the Third Floor, the mirror in her hand slicing her flesh as she squeezed it with all her mind.

It was just her paranoia. She wouldn’t be surprised if Nott had encouraged the heir into using the castle to perturb her, to feed the natural, logical fear twisting her guts. It was nothing more than another senseless, wicked prank that she was hearing. There were so many Muggle-Borns roaming Hogwarts — so many of them so clueless about magic still, weaker and less knowledgeable than her. It would make no sense for the heir to target her so soon. The probability of him failing would be higher then.

Still, however, Hermione desperately rushed her steps as she descended the regretfully moving staircases, envisioning the security of Professor McGonagall’s office.

She should have not let Nott and Malfoy get into her head. She should have blocked the words of such cowards from clouding her judgement because, as Hermione stopped abruptly to discern her surroundings, she realised that the changing staircases had skipped a floor. She was already on the Second Floor, with no way down to the first one — where McGonagall would be —, but a few feet away from the blocked entrance of Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom.

Hermione’s breath hitched, her heart rate accelerating dangerously as she turned around and found the stairs which had led her astray had moved out of her reach. She had no way out if not forward — towards where the entrance of the Chamber of Secrets was.

The first tear fell from her eyes, then, and Hermione startled upon hearing a voice.

“Are you not going to the match?” Said a soft, gentle voice. The voice of the Prefect who had told Hermione about Ravenna Yaxley’s past among Dark Magic — Penelope Clearwater.

Hermione breathed more easily, then, knowing herself to be somewhat safer. Penelope was a Ravenclaw, which meant she was as smart as the Hat had suggested Hermione was when he deliberated if he should sort her into Ravenclaw before silently deciding that her talents would be better appreciated elsewhere, of course. And Headmaster Dumbledore would never appoint a Prefect who lacked talent. Penelope would know what to do.

“Penelope, —!” Hermione started to speak, but then she realised that Penelope hadn’t been talking to her as the Prefect continued.

“Your brothers are in the Gryffindor Team, are they not?” She asked sympathetically. “Or don’t you feel like it? Your brother Percy has told me of your struggles this year. He said that you asked your parents to stay at home but they said that there is nothing to fear while Dumbledore is still here.” Hermione frowned as she rounded the corner, finding Penelope and Ginny standing exactly in front of the blocked entrance of the bathroom. “Ginny, are you feeling okay? Should I call Percy to come to get you?”

Ginny remained unresponsive, rooted to the spot. Hermione huffed at that. Ronald’s sister seemed to be just as thick as he was. Ginny Weasley had been an apparition all year long, seemingly only capable of crying over dead cats and making eyes at Harry from a distance.

Such lack of substance. Hermione had had crushes, but she was far too logical and down-to-earth to become infatuated with boys merely due to their status and appearance like all the other childish girls she was surrounded with. All those pathetic, self-respect-less airheads who had showered Nott and Malfoy with letters and gifts on Valentine’s Day. Ronald’s sister was one more example of the delay of the women’s movement if anything at all. She had never exchanged as much as two words with Harry, yet she deemed herself irrevocably in love and devoted to him.

Hermione ignored the mute younger girl as she approached courageously, gripping her bag of evidence close to her body and the mirror as she approached the duo.

“Penelope!” She exclaimed, calling the Prefect’s attention. “We must leave this floor! This instant! I figured everything out!”

“Not now, Granger.” Penelope said snappily, and Hermione frowned at the rudeness. She had thought she and Penelope got along so well all the times Hermione had sought her out to discuss Nott’s mother. She had been certain that the older girl had recognised her emotional and mental maturity. “Ginny is clearly not doing well if you haven’t noticed yet. Your ludicrous theories can wait.”

“B-But I… I figured it out. Everything!” Hermione repeated. “This bathroom is the entrance of the Chamber of Secrets! The monster is a Basilisk! We much leave this floor now!”

Penelope groaned, taking Ginny’s limp hand in hers and turning to Hermione coldly, “Look, Granger, I sincerely do not have time to tell you how ridiculous this sounds. A Basilisk is a forbidden, enormous creature which has been eradicated by the Ministry centuries ago. There is no way one can be roaming Hogwarts. Besides — such a beast kills on sight. It does not petrify.” Penelope finished. “Now, if you excuse me, I must take Ginny to the Hospital Wing. Percy has been worried sick about her and this behaviour is a clear sight of trauma. She needs healer attention.”

“B-But…” Hermione tried again, shrinking slightly both at Penelope’s glare and at the sound of pipes sliding against one another. Just paranoia, just paranoia, she repeated to herself. Her heart skipped a beat as Ginny's emotionless face behind Penelope’s shielding form smirked nastily at her, eyes flashing as her features seemed to twist maniacally. “Nott —”

“Theo Nott is just an immature prankster, Granger!” Penelope snapped. “Who happens to also be brilliant. His mother might have been a Dark Witch but she has done nothing for eleven years. You cannot keep trying to find ways to incriminate both mother and child incessantly because Theo Nott dared challenge you intellectually, Granger — Merlin!”

Hermione’s eyes stung as Penelope turned her back to her, “All the other students have only seen the reflex of the Basilisk.” She mumbled wetly, making Penelope stop once more. “That’s why they were petrified instead of killed. And the heir of Slytherin is a Parselmouth — only he can control the Basilisk, and only he can open the Chamber. That’s why no one else has ever been able to find either.”

“Stay here, Ginny. I’ll be right with you.” Penelope whispered kindly to the youngest Weasley as she rashly stepped closer to Hermione. “Do you care to tell me how you came to this conclusion? You were certain yesterday that Theo Nott was using Dark Magic to petrify students of Muggle Heritage because of his mother’s arrest eleven years ago.”

“I heard Nott and Malfoy in the library.” Hermione disclosed stubbornly, ignoring the moving pipes for a moment in order to convince Penelope of her intellect. “Their conversation was the last piece of the puzzle I needed. I figured everything out.”

“And you’ve been trying to protect yourself with a broken piece of glass?” Penelope asked smartly, nodding to Hermione’s bleeding hand.

“Yes.” Hermione replied gravely, raiding the mirror to eye-level proudly. “I’m a Muggle-Born. I helped Harry Potter defeat You-Know-Who last year, which means I have a certain reputation. I must protect myself.”

Penelope chuckled dryly under her breath, “Sure.” She mumbled. “Alright, I will accompany Ginny to the Hospital Wing, then we can both have a talk with Professor McGonagall about this. As Deputy Headmistress she may take this directly to Headmaster Dumbledore if she thinks you’re deserving of any merit.”

Before Penelope could fully finish uttering those last words, though, Ginny gasped painfully behind them, and Hermione heard a thud – as if something heavy was falling into a drenched marble floor. Cold sweat started forming on her nape and, as she raised her stare to the furthest spot shown by Malfoy’s small mirror, she saw brilliant, shiny, slit orbs.

Her scream mixed with Penelope’s as the Basilisk opened its mouth — and Hermione’s limbs started to become stiff until her mind shut down.

Everything was black.

Chapter Text

Previous Chapter (Hermione's POV)

“Theo Nott is just an immature prankster, Granger!” Penelope snapped. “Who happens to also be brilliant. His mother might have been a Dark Witch but she has done nothing for eleven years. You cannot keep trying to find ways to incriminate both mother and child incessantly because Theo Nott dared challenge you intellectually, Granger — Merlin!”

Hermione’s eyes stung as Penelope turned her back to her, “All the other students have only seen the reflex of the Basilisk.” She mumbled wetly, making Penelope stop once more. “That’s why they were petrified instead of killed. And the heir of Slytherin is a Parselmouth — only he can control the Basilisk, and only he can open the Chamber. That’s why no one else has ever been able to find either.”

“Stay here, Ginny. I’ll be right with you.” Penelope whispered kindly to the youngest Weasley as she rashly stepped closer to Hermione. “Do you care to tell me how you came to this conclusion? You were certain yesterday that Theo Nott was using Dark Magic to petrify students of Muggle Heritage because of his mother’s arrest eleven years ago.”

“I heard Nott and Malfoy in the library.” Hermione disclosed stubbornly, ignoring the moving pipes for a moment in order to convince Penelope of her intellect. “Their conversation was the last piece of the puzzle I needed. I figured everything out.”

“And you’ve been trying to protect yourself with a broken piece of glass?” Penelope asked smartly, nodding to Hermione’s bleeding hand.

“Yes.” Hermione replied gravely, raiding the mirror to eye-level proudly. “I’m a Muggle-Born. I helped Harry Potter defeat You-Know-Who last year, which means I have a certain reputation. I must protect myself.”

Penelope chuckled dryly under her breath, “Sure.” She mumbled. “Alright, I will accompany Ginny to the Hospital Wing, then we can both have a talk with Professor McGonagall about this. As Deputy Headmistress she may take this directly to Headmaster Dumbledore if she thinks you’re deserving of any merit.”

Before Penelope could fully finish uttering those last words, though, Ginny gasped painfully behind them, and Hermione heard a thud – as if something heavy was falling into a drenched marble floor. Cold sweat started forming on her nape and, as she raised her stare to the furthest spot shown by Malfoy’s small mirror, she saw brilliant, shiny, slit orbs.

Her scream mixed with Penelope’s as the Basilisk opened its mouth — and Hermione’s limbs started to become stiff until her mind shut down.

Everything was black.

Harry felt his insides twisting nauseatingly as he and Ron approached the double tall doors of the Hospital Wing, where McGonagall’s imposing figure waited stoically for them.

He knew it to be a trick of his mind, but it was like the corridor had expanded somehow. As if it had stretched and pulled Harry backwards as he walked forward.

He gulped as he and Ron stopped in front of their professor who sucked a breath as her stern eyes focused on them.

“This will be a bit of a shock,” she said in a surprisingly gentle voice, her body preventing Ron from pushing the door of the infirmary open, “There has been another attack… another double attack this time.”

Harry swallowed dryly, feeling dread. There was only one reason why he and Ron would have both been summoned without Hermione, “Who?” He asked roughly.

McGonagall was about to answer when the doors behind her hit her on her back, sending her stumbling forward as two figures stepped out — one with hair as dark as night and the other as light as day.

“Theo?” McGonagall stuttered.

“Shit.” Theo Nott mumbled while Draco Malfoy face-palmed.

“I told you I heard someone.” The blond whispered angrily, rolling his eyes as Nott glared at him.

“Are you not feeling well?” McGonagall unbelievably asked Nott; an undertone of worry coating her voice.  Nott just continued standing there as if trying to come up with the best excuse. His silverly grey eyes lightened up with mirth as he noticed Ron and Harry glumly waiting behind their professor, and Harry didn’t like the wicked glance he exchanged with Malfoy. “Theo, are you not feeling well? What are you doing in the Hospital Wing?”

“Nothing major, Minerva.” Nott drawled lazily, grinning charmingly at their professor — who rolled her eyes at him. “I’ve been feeling a bit weird since last night. That fish at dinner didn’t quite agree with me. Draco and I thought we would ask Madam Pomfrey to rid me of this stomach bug before we went to watch the match. But I guess we, mere mortals, have become irrelevant now that Golden Boy’s favourite beaver became stone.”

“What?!” Ron shrieked shrilly, looking at Harry with widened blue eyes.

Harry was gaping himself, the guilt spreading through his body as he was reminded of how dismissive of Hermione’s absence he and Ron had been. She had been so annoying. So, so irritating. And now she was petrified by the heir. Without the two of them, she became vulnerable. She had no other friends — a lonely Muggle-Born for the monster of Slytherin to find.

“Oh, you didn’t know, Weasley?” Malfoy asked ironically. “How tactless of you, Theo. Weasley and Potter had no idea the heir has finally gotten tired of poor, defenceless Granger.”

“That’s quite enough, you two.” McGonagall reprimanded them. “Detention, Theo. You will spend your whole weekend grading papers with me.”

Nott groaned, “Come on, Minerva.” He complained. “You don’t even like my grading system — I reckon you telling me that I can’t grade someone stupid. Why are you torturing me?”

Harry rolled his eyes despite the fragility of his spirit. Nott was such a drama queen.

“Think more carefully, then, the next time you lie to me.” McGonagall replied sassily. “You had pasta for dinner last night, Theo. I reprimanded you for staining your shirt with tomato sauce.”

“Damn — forgot about that.” Nott mumbled. “Fine, whatever.” He smirked. “I know that’s just a ruse to get me all to yourself, Minerva.”

“Scatter before I lose my patience, Theo.” McGonagall said tiredly. “And don’t think for one second, I will forget that you were sneaking into the infirmary, Mr. Nott. One more of those and I’ll be personally writing your mother.”

Nott grimaced, “Low blow, Minerva.”

“She has always had a talent to keep troublesome wizards like you in line.” Their Transfiguration Professor announced puzzlingly, and Nott stared at her weirdly before letting himself be pushed away by Malfoy. McGonagall watched the two Slytherins go with a frown on her face, shaking her hand when the last of their steps faded. “Potter, Weasley, I don’t see any more reason to beat around the bush now that Mr. Nott and Mr. Malfoy have done the pleasantries. Miss Granger and Miss Clearwater were found on the Second Floor by Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom. They will recover — as will the others. It will, however, take some time still for the Mandrakes to mature and so Professor Snape can brew the antidote. In the meantime, I expect the two of your to be on your best behaviours. Miss Granger’s situation shall be no excuse for unadvised adventures such as last year’s, not for any academic slackness.” She proclaimed sternly and, nodding at them once more, McGonagall gathered her skirts to walk away. “I am sorry. The professors and I are doing all we can to remediate this unfortunate situation.” She said lowly.

Harry was still staring after the disappearing professor as Ron pushed the doors open.

The warning had been clear. McGonagall’s exasperation with them had been clear. Her reproachfulness, too. She had not seemed proud of their accomplishments the year before, even if they had won Gryffindor the House Cup.

They had saved the school — the three of them. Harry, Ron and Hermione had risked their lives by going into that trapdoor and stopping Voldemort from coming back to life. They had aced every trial the professors put in place as obstacles. They had succeeded and stopped Quirrel from acquiring the Sorcerer’s Stone.

Harry only now realised that the only adult who had ever remotely acknowledged their actions was Dumbledore when he came to speak with Harry about the protection his mother’s sacrifice had cast onto him. The headmaster had seemed gleeful as he remarked that Voldemort had no way of touching him.

For the first time, Harry wondered if he had actually saved anything the year before, or if Snape had been bitterly right when he called him an unimpressive, talentless attention seeker who thought himself above because of the scar marking his forehead.

It seemed stupid that someone as remarkably brilliant as professor McGonagall, or even as irrefutably smart as professor Snape would attempt to stop the darkest wizards of all times with riddles and puzzles that a bunch of eleven-year-olds barely educated in magic could solve.

It seemed stupidly random that the professors would assume that Lord Voldemort would not know how to overcome a plant scared of sunlight whose weakness was narrated by a childish lullaby. That the wizard who had had the Wizarding World at his mercy once would be stopped by an old broom and winged keys.

Harry now wondered if he, Ron and Hermione had been in any danger at all. If they had any reason at all to gloat. If the points they had been granted had been deserved, and if the rest of the school had really celebrated with them rather than being resented.

He shook his head to rid himself of such thoughts as he and Ron quickly approached the bed where Hermione was. She looked tiny laying there, utterly still, with her eyes open and unnaturally glassy, as if she had been about to cry before being petrified.

Harry held her gelid hand in his, his head pending forward helplessly.

“Why do you reckon she would be holding a mirror?” Ron asked him emotionlessly, and Harry looked at where his friend was pointing.

In Hermione’s raised hand, was a tiny piece of glass reflecting her eyes. She had been looking into it when it happened — for whatever reason, “I don’t know.”

“Nott and Malfoy have been calling her a beaver all year long.” Ron commented hollowly. “We never really said anything to it. Maybe she was trying some spell to shrink her teeth and needed the mirror to see better. It would explain why she was on the second floor, wouldn’t it? — If I was trying to fix my face, I’d do it where no one can see me. Myrtle’s bathroom would be perfect.”

“Yeah, maybe.” Harry mumbled. “We should tell her when she wakes up — that her teeth are not as bad as Nott and Malfoy say.”

Ron only shrugged and they stood there in silence until McGonagall’s announcement startled them alert.

“All students will return to their House Common Rooms by six o’clock in the evening. No student is to leave the dormitories after that time. You will be escorted to each lesson by a teacher. No student is to use the bathroom unaccompanied by a teacher. All further Quidditch training and matches are to be postponed. There will be no evening activities.” The stern note changed to a somewhat choked undertone as McGonagall continued. “I need hardly add that I have rarely been so distressed in my years lecturing. It is likely that the school will be closed unless the culprit behind these attacks is caught. I would urge anyone who thinks they might know anything about them to come forward.”

Harry and Ron found their Common Room completely silent, albeit packed with students of all years, as they climbed the portrait.

“That’s two Gryffindors down, not counting a Gryffindor ghost, one Ravenclaw, and one Hufflepuff.” Lee Jordan said after a beat, being listened to by all. “Haven’t any of the teachers noticed that the Slytherins are all safe? Isn’t it obvious all this stuff’s coming from Slytherin? The Heir of Slytherin, the monster of Slytherin — why don’t they just chuck all the Slytherins out?” Lee’s whisper became a roar as he was urged on by nods.

Harry was nodding along with him until he stopped. It hadn’t been a Slytherin unleashing the monster last time. It had been Hagrid — a Gryffindor.

“They’re a bunch of scum, that’s what they are!” Ron joined the cries of the crowd. “Doesn’t everybody know there is a reason why those gits are down in the dungeons?! They should have a one-way ticket to Azkaban!”

Harry sighed, pulling his friend by his robes to their dorm.

“What is it, Harry?” Ron asked snappily — probably missing the applause he had been receiving.

“There isn’t a single Muggle-Born in Slytherin.” He remarked quietly. “That’s why they haven’t been attacked. Do I really need to remind you, Ron? A Gryffindor let the monster loose last time — not a Slytherin. And half of the school thought I was the heir. They probably just don’t think that now because it was Hermione who’s been petrified this time.”

Ron open and closed his mouth a few times before his eyes assumed a stubborn glint.

“Penelope Clearwater is not a Muggle-Born, Harry.” He stated. “The Heir is targeting everyone who isn’t a Slytherin now.”

“No.” Harry insisted exhaustedly. “Didn’t you hear McGonagall? Penelope and Hermione were together. Hermione was holding the mirror. The heir came for her. Penelope was collateral, Ron!”

Ron scowled, unable to argue against anything Harry said.

“What do you propose we do, then?” He asked angrily. “Hermione was bloody wrong this time, wasn’t she? Nott and Malfoy have nothing to do with anything. We can’t just go to McGonagall and tell her that her favourite student ever is looking for a fifty-year-old diary that we snatched from the girl’s bathroom right under his nose — and that we lost it!”

“We have to go talk to Hagrid.” Harry said glumly. “Maybe he can tell us something we’ve been missing.”

“We can’t go strutting there now, can we?” Ron asked ironically. “McGonagall will have our heads if we break the new rules.”

“It’s time to take my invisibility cloak out of my trunk, then.” Harry answered simply, waiting until Ron nodded his head resolutely.

It was a clear, starry night as Ron and Harry shed the invisibly cloak a safe distance away from the castle full of patrolling teachers, ghosts and Prefects. It was like the night had not been warned of the tension or of the eery mood coating the very walls of the castle. The moon was shining as brightly as Harry knew Nott and Malfoy to be sleeping soundlessly — probably the only ones at Hogwarts still capable of being at peace.

After the last double attack, more students were pulled out of school by their concerned parents.

Harry wondered what his parents would have done. Now he dreaded the closing of Hogwarts, as he would rather come face to face with the Heir of Slytherin than to have to spend all his time at the Dursleys. But still, it brought him a welcomed warmth to think that his mom and dad would have come barrelling through the double doors of the Great Hall and demanded he returned home — where he would be safe.

Nott’s mom had done something similar.

Harry had been standing by the Charms’ classroom, waiting for Percy to escort the Second-Year Gryffindors to their next lesson when McGonagall had appeared dragging Nott by his ear.

“Irresponsible, that’s what you are, Theo!” She had been hissing under her breath. “A moronic, inconsequential prankster who doesn’t know when to quit!”

“Merlin, Minerva! Ouch!” Nott had moaned amid groans as he tried to keep up with their professor while he tripped over his feet upon having his ear pulled. “It was no big deal! I just… didn’t respond to mom’s letters straight away! I’ve been busy!”

“Busy not writing home to her about what’s been going on, right?!” McGonagall had raged. “The havoc that witch can cause when you’re concerned!” She had vented. “You promised your mother you would write to her every day. What did you think would happen when she didn’t hear from you?!”

“She wants to bring me home! I don’t wanna go home!” Nott had frustratingly roared back. “I didn’t think she would come here and threaten to sue the staff! It’s not like I’m in any danger!”

“You tell that to her!” McGonagall had replied snappily, all her composure gone as she halted at the staircase and, before climbing up, she had adjusted Nott’s appearance — much to his dismay. The Slytherin had mumbled obscenities the whole time as McGonagall knotted his tie, combed his hair, buttoned up his shirt and put it inside his pants, finishing up by vanishing his fingerless gloves. “Your mother and father are in my office right now — demanding to see you. Ravenna has kindly made me aware of her intentions of snapping the neck of every one of the animals I use in my lessons if you do not appear in front of her before her patience runs thin.”

Nott had huffed, “Maybe those yoga lessons she has been taking with dad are worth the money she is paying for them, after all.” He had drawled cheekily. “I guessed at least the rabbits would’ve all been dead by now.”

McGonagall had slapped Nott behind his head, then, literally growling at him to behave if he really wanted her to vouch for him so he could stay in school with Malfoy. Nott had nodded, then, and, side by side with their professor, he had climbed the stairs to where his mother was waiting for him.

Harry had heard from some Ravenclaws that Ravenna Nott had allowed her son to stay, but now Snape was tasked with walking Nott and Malfoy three times a day to the owlery so Nott could send a letter home. Apparently, she had also forbidden him from breaking the school rules — he was to do his pranks before curfew. And she had demanded McGonagall observe her son’s every move, also allowing the Transfiguration professor to ground him were he to disobey her orders.

Nott had grinned at McGonagall the whole day as she sulked back at him.

Harry thought Ron had been more affected by it than he was letting on, too. His friend’s parents had never written to him. Mr. and Mrs. Weasley had addressed a letter to Percy in which they put him in charge of all his younger siblings — emphasising the twins and Harry at various points throughout the long letter. Never Ron, though. And Mrs. Weasley had shown no concern as the one Lady Nott had displayed by barging into Hogwarts and threatening everyone inside if she wasn’t granted immediate access to her son.

Mr. and Mrs. Weasley were sure there was nothing to worry about while their children were at Hogwarts. They were sure that nothing ill could befall them as long as Dumbledore was still there. They knew of Hermione’s petrification, but Mrs. Weasley had just written that their friend would be healed in no time. It was just a pickle; she had reckoned in her letter. Nothing to fear, as Headmaster Dumbledore would soon remediate the unfortunate event.

Harry and Ron hurried toward the lit windows of Hagrid’s hut and knocked on his crooked door. Hagrid flung it open with a crossbow aimed at the two of them while Fang barked loudly behind him.

“Oh.” He said, lowering the weapon and staring at them. “What’re you two doin’ here?”

“Blimey, Hagrid — what’s this big bow for?” Ron asked breathlessly as they dubiously stepped inside.

“Oh, this… uhm… nothin’ — nothin’ —” Hagrid muttered almost unintelligibly. “I’ve bin expectin’ — doesn’ matter — Sit, sit… I’ll make tea —”

Hagrid seemed utterly lost, barely knowing what he was even doing. Harry felt incredibly bad for not coming earlier, then. He had been so fixated on Nott and Malfoy all this time. So fixated on Ravenna Yaxley and her hatred for Muggles. He had been so entranced by the mystery of Riddle’s diary. He had forgotten to consider what the reopening of the Chamber and the escape of the monster within might have done to his only other friend at Hogwarts.

“Are you okay, Hagrid?” Harry asked as Hagrid nearly extinguished the fire, spilling water from the kettle on it, and then smashed the teapot with a nervous jerk of his massive hand. “Did you… did you hear about Hermione?”

“Oh, I heard. Yeah, heard it.” Hagrid said brokenly.

Harry didn’t know what to say as Hagrid kept glancing nervously at the blurry windows of his hut. He poured him and Ron large mugs of boiling water and was just putting a slab of fruitcake on a plate when there was a loud, obnoxious knock on the door.

He and Ron exchanged panic-stricken looks, and then Harry hurriedly threw the cloak back over themselves, backing Ron forcefully into a corner as Hagrid followed to the door.

“Good evening, Hagrid.” Dumbledore said warmly, though deadly serious as he entered, followed by an odd-looking man.

The stranger had rumpled grey hair and an anxious expression, and was wearing a strange mixture of clothes: a pinstriped suit, a scarlet tie, and a long black cloak, and pointed purple boots. Under his arm, he carried a lime-green bowler.

“That’s dad’s boss.” Ron breathed in shock. “Cornelius Fudge, the Minister of Magic!”

Harry elbowed Ron to make him shut up.

“Bad business, Hagrid.” Said Fudge in a clipped tone. “Very bad business. Had to come. Four attacks on Muggle-Borns. Things’ve gone far enough. Ministry’s got to act.”

“I never,” Hagrid stuttered, his face sweaty as he nervously twisted his hands. Harry felt the colour draining from his face little by little as a small part of him berated him for blaming Hagrid based on the memories of a ghost. The sight Hagrid made was pitiful as he fidgeted, looking hopelessly from Dumbledore to Minister Fudge. “You know I never, Professor Dumbledore, sir —”

“I want it understood, Cornelius, that Hagrid has my full confidence.” Dumbledore declared in an iron voice as he frowned at the Minister, and that small part inside of Harry grew.

“Look, Albus,” Fudge said uncomfortably, “Hagrid’s record’s against him. Ministry’s got to do something — the school governors have been in touch —”

“Yet again, Cornelius, I tell you that taking Hagrid away will not help in the slightest.” Dumbledore said more forcefully. Almost angrily. Unlike anything, Harry had ever seen from the headmaster.

“Look at it from my point of view, Albus!” The Minister exclaimed dismayed, gesticulating widely — way too clumsily for a Minister — with his bowler. “I’m under unimaginable pressure! I must be seen doing something, Albus! I have Lucius Malfoy on one side, roaring about the incompetence of every single wizard and witch within this castle! How long do you reckon it will take him to start manipulating the tabloids against me? — the Minister who did nothing as the Chamber of Secrets was opened once more! And I have Lorcan Nott on my other side, demanding action! You more than anyone know what Ravenna Yaxley is capable of, Albus! You’ve seen it. She will go off the handle again if something befalls that boy of hers! And she is untouchable! If the name Yaxley wasn’t enough, her being also a Nott gives her more impunity power than everyone else!”

“Ravenna Yaxley knows not to cross me.” Dumbledore said with actual venom.

Harry recoiled, as did Ron. And Hagrid.

“You said that last time, Albus.” The Minister whispered in terror. “You promised that the last time and we were left to deal with a cold-blooded slaughter in the middle of Muggle London.”

“We sent her to Azkaban.” Dumbledore insisted.

“For three months, Albus!” Fudge exclaimed. “Three meaningless months that only served to enrage that witch more! Both her and her husband! Lorcan Nott did and he will continue to do the impossible for his wife — we both know that. Don’t you remember her words after she gave birth to her son? Something happens to that boy, and we will wish for You-Know-Who to be back. Those were her words, Albus. And you’ve allowed the Slytherin monster to run loose on the castle with her boy sleeping under the same roof!” The Minister’s chubby face was drenched in a nervous sweat as he finished. “I must do something, Albus — the decision barely lies in my hands anymore. I don’t like this any more than you do. If it turns out it wasn’t Hagrid, he’ll be back and no more said. But I’ve got to take him. I must.”

“Take me?” Hagrid uttered shakily. He was trembling. “Take me where?”

“For a short stretch only.” Fudge said regretfully, unable to stare Hagrid in the eye. Harry was suddenly guiltily glad for the Minister’s interruption. He wouldn’t want to be at the end of Hagrid’s betrayed, fearful stare once he asked if he had actually been behind the death of a Muggle-Born fifty years ago. “Not a punishment, Hagrid, more a precaution. If someone else is caught, you’ll be let out with a full apology —”

“Not Azkaban?” Hagrid croaked but, before Fudge could answer, there was another pound on the door.

Dumbledore answered it, and Harry let out an audible gasp.

Lucius Malfoy strode into Hagrid’s hut, swathed in a long black travelling cloak, smiling a cold and satisfied smile that had Fang growling.

“Already here, Fudge.” He said approvingly, with such a lack of respect that Harry felt himself stumbling into Ron. It was like the Minister was but a vermin to Mr. Malfoy. Some kind of servant for him to command, and Harry understood the Minister’s fear, his nervousness. Lucius Malfoy and Lorcan Nott were more than the Minister of Magic. Their wielded more power — such power which was not limited by any laws or legislations or protocols. They could do as they pleased. The Minister was but a marionette to Mr. Malfoy. “Good.”

“What’re you doin’ here?” Hagrid asked furiously. “Get outta my house!”

“My dear man, please, believe me, I have no pleasure at all being inside your — er — d’you call this a house?” Mr. Malfoy sneered as he looked around the small cabin in disgust. “I simply called at the school and was told that the headmaster was here.”

“And what exactly did you want with me, Lucius?” Dumbledore asked politely, but there was some of the same hateful fire in his eyes as when he had spoken of Ravenna Nott.

“Dreadful thing, Dumbledore.” Lucius Malfoy said lazily, drawling out each word with enormous pleasure as he took out a long roll of parchment. “But the governors feel it’s time for you to step aside. This is an Order of Suspension — you’ll find all twelve signatures on it. I’m afraid we feel you’re losing your touch. How many attacks have there been now? Two more recently, wasn’t it? At this rate, there’ll be no more Muggle-Borns left at Hogwarts, and we all know what an awful loss that would be to the school.”

Harry scowled darkly. Mr. Malfoy was such a foul snake. Everything about him. He couldn’t even pretend to care about the Muggle-Borns. While his words were to be sympathetic, the mocking undertone prevailed over their meaning. His satisfied smirk spoke louder than his fake intentions.

“Oh, now, see here, Lucius,” the Minister started alarmed, not even being acknowledged by Mr. Malfoy’s cold stare, “Dumbledore suspended — no, no — last thing we want just now.”

“The appointment — or suspension — of the headmaster is a matter for the Board of Governors, Fudge.” Mr. Malfoy said smoothly. “And as Dumbledore has failed to stop these attacks —”

“See here, Lucius, if Dumbledore can’t stop them,” said Fudge, sweating more heavily than Harry thought possible, “I mean to say, who can?”

“That remains to be seen.” Lucius Malfoy said silkily, smiling nastily at the stoic headmaster. “But as all twelve of us have voted —”

“What’s the role of Ravenna Nott in this, Lucius?” Dumbledore interrupted, blue eyes flaring. Harry was shocked to see the dreaded resolution within the headmaster. His own helplessness before Malfoy’s father.

Mr. Malfoy laughed loudly at that, his body shaking as he stared at Dumbledore incredulously.

“Ravenna?” He asked mid-chuckles. “You sincerely believe that Ravenna bothers with you, Dumbledore? Please. You’re dirt on the pointy heels of that witch, that’s what you are.”

“You mean to tell that Ravenna harbours no grudges against me?” Dumbledore asked sceptically.

“I mean to say that Ravenna Yaxley would find more creative and painful ways to hurt you than to suspend you.” Lucius Malfoy said lowly. “She cares nothing for you, Dumbledore. That witch concerns herself with nothing other than her brats and her spineless husband.”

“You forget the leverage I have on her.” Dumbledore hissed. “I give the execution order, and her world crumbles.”

“That leverage dried out a long time ago. If anything, you made things worse for yourself by stopping a fair trial for that incident eleven years ago.” Mr. Malfoy smirked. “You make this execution happen, Dumbledore, and that witch will kill you with her bare hands.”

“I don’t remember you being so close to Lady Nott.” Dumbledore switched topics quickly.

Lucius Malfoy just smirked, “I’m not.” He declared simply. “Now you see just how senile you’ve become. Out of touch with the simplest of realities.”

Hagrid stood straighter to protest, his frame towering over Mr. Malfoy. Harry fumed as Dumbledore stopped him before he could utter a word, though, the fire extinguishing from his blue orbs.

“I assume Lorcan Nott has signed the suspension?” He asked unnervingly warmly.

“Indeed.” Lucius said through gritted teeth.

“What did he want in return?” The headmaster asked evenly.

“Nothing but space.”

“Space to act on his own terms, I presume?” Dumbledore probed but Mr. Malfoy refused to reply. “He did not seem happy on his last visit with his wife. Quite worried, the two of them. They were ready to take the boy home with them and order the school shut.”

“His wishes have not changed, Dumbledore.” Mr. Malfoy declared meaningly, and Harry staggered more.

“Very well.” Dumbledore sighed. “If the governors want my removal, Lucius, I shall of course step aside —”

“B-But —” stuttered Fudge.

“No!” Hagrid thankfully growled, muffling Harry’s own protest.

“However,” Dumbledore continued as if he hadn’t been interrupted, speaking slowly and clearly so that none of them could miss a word, “you will find that I will only truly have left this school when none here are loyal to me… Help will always be given at Hogwarts to those who ask for it.”

Harry gulped nervously. For a second, he was almost sure that Dumbledore’s eyes flickered toward the corner where he and Ron were hidden.

“We’ll see how many students and members of the faculty will prove you correct, then. I hear your popularity has been diminished, has it not?” Malfoy’s dad taunted. “People tend to remember when their proclaimed protector fails to fight in a war, recruiting children fresh out of Hogwarts to defend his cause. Oh, and then there is the matter of your lack of objectivity, am I correct? Blunt favouritism, refusing a role in the government but insisting on interfering with every law opposed to your liking… People get annoyed, Dumbledore, and loyalty only lasts forever among mindless fools.”

“You do not speak this way, Malfoy!” Hagrid roared.

“Case in point.” Mr. Malfoys drawled lazily. “An admirable sentiment nevertheless, Dumbledore. I only hope your successor will manage to prevent any… killings.”

He strode to the cabin door, opened it, and bowed Dumbledore out. Fudge, fiddling with his bowler, waited for Hagrid to go ahead of him, but Hagrid stood his ground, took a deep breath, and said carefully, “If anyone wanted ter to find out some stuff, all they’d have ter do would be ter follow the spiders. That’d lead ‘em right. That’s all I’m sayin’ .”

Fudge groaned deep within his throat, “You’re doing a poor job of helping yourself, my friend.”

“Alright, I’m comin’.” Hagrid said, pulling on his moleskin overcoat. “An’ someone’ll need ter feed Fang while I’m away.” He yelled at seemingly nothing before the door was banged shut behind him.

Ron pulled off the invisibility cloak with his face just as pale as Harry’s.

“Nott’s mother…” he uttered gutturally, gulping as he was unable to find good enough words to describe the feeling of pure terror which had been once again ignited within them. “No Dumbledore — we’re in trouble now. My parents, they always say that Dumbledore is the only thing standing in the way of darkness. They might as well close the school tonight now that he is away. There’ll be an attack a day with him gone.”

“Maybe Nott’s parents will do something.” Harry offered lamely. “If only because they want their son alive.”

“The problem is, Harry, they don’t care about anything else other than their son.” Ron whispered fearfully. “What do we do now?”

“We follow the spiders. And pray that we find something on the heir before he goes on a killing spree.”

Two weeks passed with fear weighing the air around Hogwarts. Summer was creeping over the grounds, but the warmth was anti-climactic as all Harry felt was gelid cold freezing his bones, and numbing his body.

Visits to the Hospital Wing have been forbidden. Hushed, desperate chatter was the only knife cutting through the tension hovering heavily above their heads. There was no laughter, no chortle, no excitement. There was barely anything more than an automatic, charged routine they had to follow strictly, or else risk being attacked.

Not even the professors seemed unaffected by the terror as they escorted groups of students at a time with wide eyes. The only time McGonagall seemed able to relax — however slightly — was when Nott distracted her with another dumb prank, or when he made somebody cry.

Harry didn’t engage in the bashing of the Slytherin, then. Not when he noticed the small grin playing on Nott’s lips whenever McGonagall forgot her worries in order to scream at him and give him yet another round of detentions.

Harry said nothing when few allowed themselves to smile slightly whenever news came of the new humiliation Nott had employed against Lockhart in his own classroom.

When he was not focused on Nott, looking over his shoulder in case Nott’s parents appeared without warning now that Dumbledore was gone, Harry repeated the headmaster’s final words to himself. He couldn’t understand what good those words even were. Who exactly was he supposed to ask for help, when everyone was just as confused and scared as he was?

Hagrid’s hint about the spiders was far easier to interpret. The trouble was, there didn’t seem to be a single spider left in the castle to follow. Harry looked everywhere he went, barely helped by Ron — and found absolutely nothing. And he could find no opportunity to do much exploring of his own. There wasn’t a single moment of solitude granted to anyone these days. There wasn’t one corner of Hogwarts not being patrolled by someone.

Harry startled as the bell rang loudly, indicating the end of their potions lesson.

“Hurry up, I’ve got to take you all to Herbology.” Snape barked over the class’ heads, dictating a swift pace for the march. Harry and Ron were annoyedly bringing the rear when they stopped in their tracks upon hearing Malfoy and Nott talking in whispers between themselves a few feet ahead.

“That sounds a bit too mad, Drakey.” Nott was saying. “Even if we are talking about very dark magic.”

“Can you think of any other explanation?” Malfoy asked lowly. “There is nothing else, Theo. There is no heir. Not a living one, that is.”

“I wrote my mom.” Nott admitted, averting his eyes slightly. “I know we agreed that I shouldn’t, but she will let nothing happen to you. And there isn’t much time left, anyway. Golden Boy and his sidekick are thicker than we anticipated. They will never find the clue and we can’t afford to go to them — not with this constant watching.”

“What did you tell her?” Malfoy asked evenly.

“Everything.” Nott shrugged. “Including the possession bit. Mom will know what to do. She and dad always know what to do.”

“Let’s hope so.” Malfoy breathed out, letting Nott clap him on the shoulder as the two Slytherins walked arm-in-arm to the greenhouse. As they were exiting the castle, Malfoy stopped again. “Look, Theo.”

“The spiders are really fleeing.” Nott remarked, and Harry and Ron frowned as they inched closer silently. Several large spiders were scuttling over the ground on the other side of the glass, moving in an unnaturally straight line as though taking the shortest route to a prearranged meeting. “You know what that means, right?”

“Your parents must pull the strings of their connections much faster than we thought.” Malfoy said hollowly.

“It looks like they are going to the Forbidden Forest.” Nott said after a beat, not elaborating anything further than incomprehensible sentences that only Malfoy could understand. “Do you reckon there is a colony there?”

“Could be.” Malfoy sounded unconcerned as he rolled his shoulders backwards. “There are all kinds of beasts in that forest.”

“It should be fun to take a lap there, hum?”

“There is a certain limit to stupidity, Theo.” Malfoy drawled. “And I’d rather not cross it with you.”

“You’re no fun, Drakey.” Nott pouted playfully. “Just imagine how awesome it would be to come face to face with a werewolf. We could have one for a pet — play catch every full moon.”

“You disturb me sometimes.”

“You disturb me sometimes.” Nott replied lazily. “You fold your socks, Drakey. And you wear them in pairs. No one does that.”

“Everyone does that, Theo.” Malfoy deadpanned, pulling Nott forward as Snape barked for everyone to keep up or be eaten by the monster.

Harry and Ron stayed behind as Nott and Malfoy continued to tease each other as they rushed to the front of the group.

“We’ll have to use the invisibility cloak again.” He told Ron before his friend could start protesting. “We can take Fang with us. He’s used to going to the forest with Hagrid, he might be some help.”

“Right.” Ron said, twisting his fingers nervously. “Er — are you sure that’s a good idea, Harry? Malfoy and Nott — they aren’t wrong. The foulest creatures live in that forest. Werewolves may not even be the worst we can find there. Maybe we should — er — maybe we should let Nott’s parents take care of this one.”

“Do you really trust them to do the right thing?” Harry asked snappily. “After everything we heard at Hagrid’s.”

“I don’t, Harry, but — the forest…”

“Hagrid wouldn’t send us anywhere for us to die.” He said with finality.

“Er— right, I guess…”

“We should do this tonight.” Harry declared. “You heard Nott and Malfoy. Whatever it is that they know, the spiders disappearing to the same place is not a good sign. It means time is running out.”

“You’re relying on Nott and Malfoy now?” Ron inquired; his face just as red as it was nauseated. “What if they knew we were listening, Harry? They also said that they’ve been leaving clues for you to find. For all we know, this could have been another one, and they are leading both of us to slaughter just like Nott’s mother did to those Muggles.”

“Ravenna wouldn’t’ve been so worried about her son if she had anything to do with this. If Nott did.” Harry said simply. “She is no good — we know that. Trusting her is a huge mistake. But we were wrong when we assumed she was to blame for the Chamber.”

“What do you reckon is this clue, then?”

“My guess is just as good as yours.” Harry said. “Maybe it’s good that we haven’t found it.”

“Yeah.” Ron mumbled, going ahead of Harry without any more protests.

“Do you reckon there’s something wrong with Ginny?” Ron asked Harry abruptly under the Invisibility Cloak as they finally exited the portrait hole after succeeding in dodging the twins.

Harry shrugged, unsure of what to reply.

None of Ron’s siblings has been behaving exactly normally since the last double attack – since a Half-Blood was petrified. And since Dumbledore was taken away from Hogwarts with no prospect of a victorious return.

Their parents continued faithful that there was nothing to fear. Mr. and Mrs. Weasley have never breached the subject of withdrawing their children from school like so many other parents. They had attempted to do nothing similar to what Lady Nott had pulled.

Harry supposed none of their sons was particularly happy about their dismissiveness of the danger. And he supposed that the twins weren’t particularly happy at being forcefully tasked with watching over their younger siblings now that Percy was miraculously not hovering above them, spilling rules and norms from the school and silently gloating about the silver badge pinned to his chest.    

Ron’s third oldest brother didn’t resemble himself. His state was literally dishevelled, and Harry knew he had slackened in his schooling into the levels of an averagely well-accomplished student.

But Harry had not noticed anything amiss with his best friend’s sister. Nothing was more amiss than her usual blushing, mute self. Though, now that he thought about it, she had not been blushing senselessly whenever he was around anymore. She was not squeaking in alarm upon catching sight of him and hurrying the furthest away from him that her wobbly legs could take her without tripping on the lengthy ends of her second-hand robes.

Ginny has been… unnervingly attentive to him lately. Harry had caught her staring and, before turning away from her, he had felt oddly eery. Gone was the blind infatuation with the famous Boy-Who-Lived. Gone were the small sighs she let escape whenever he acknowledged her.

She seemed always calculating as she glanced his way. She seemed menacingly curious.

Harry had not realised it before, but he had found an excuse to skitter away from her whenever she planted herself close to him and Ron, usually occupying the vacant spot left by Hermione’s imposed absence.

“Percy was always going on and on about her being scared before he shut down – for whatever reason. Maybe he is afraid the new headmaster won’t make him Head Boy like Dumbledore probably would.”

Harry shrugged again as the two of them stepped out into the moonlit grounds, “I guess she does always look scared.”

“Still, though,” Ron insisted as he strode across the black grass with wide eyes – probably relieved that they haven’t seen a single spider since earlier that day, “she would never shut up when you were not around. Now she is just… there, ya know? If she pales any more, people will start taking her for another miserable ghost hunting the school.”

“Have you tried writing to your parents?”

“Haven’t got the time to go to the Owlery.” Ron admitted bitterly. Mere students were not granted the same privileges as Ravenna Nott’s son. No other parent could intimidate the professors into taking their children countless times a day to correspond with home, outside the strict schedule in which determined students were taken there by a member of the faculty. “Fred and George snuck out the other night, though. Mom reckons Ginny is just upset because her first year at Hogwarts sucks so much. And she blames the Slytherins anyway – Nott and Malfoy.”

“Hum?” Harry inquired, startling out of his aloofness. “Why?”

“What Nott said on Valentine’s Day.” Ron explained. “Mom and dad had half a mind to involve Dumbledore in it. Those Slytherins, they say, always finding opportunities to destroy the happiness of the Gryffindors. Dad reckons that Nott is just like his parents. He says Lady Nott is just as vicious.”

Harry frowned slightly, “If you say so.”

Nott was quite nasty, Harry knew that. But what he did to Ginny was nothing in comparison to the pranks he pulled on the rest of the student body.

It was easy to just dump the blame onto Nott and Malfoy, though. It made sense for them to be wicked. They were Slytherins, after all. They were the sons of dark wizards who had fought for Voldemort in the past. They basked in cruelty, that’s why they were made to sleep in the dungeons.

They were the future evil of the world. But still… Harry sometimes wondered.

The Sorting Hat had hinted at Slytherins’ greatness. And it had hinted at how well Harry could have fit in there.

Harry and Ron reached Hagrid’s house – sad and sorry-looking with its blank windows. As they pushed open the door, Fang went mad with joy at the sight of them. Harry attempted to insensitively shush him and, when it was to no avail, Ron fed him treacle fudge from a tin on the mantelpiece, which thankfully glued Fang’s teeth together.

Harry left the Invisibility Cloak on Hagrid’s table – swallowing thickly as he exchanged an increasingly uneasy glance with Ron. They wouldn’t need the cloak in the pitch-dark forest. And he would hate to damage his father’s only legacy if they came face to face with one of the beasts Nott had spoken so maniacally excitedly about.

Did his fear subsume his bravery? Harry wondered fearfully as his resolve to enter the forest faltered slightly. Did his fear mean that he was wrong to have begged the hat to put him in Gryffindor? Did Nott’s lack of fear mean that he had more courage than Harry? That he was even better than him?

Harry shook his head at himself. He was doing this for Hermione. He was doing this for Hagrid. And he was doing this for himself. He was more than a scar. More than Nott, too, because he did not let his fear deter him from doing the right thing.

“Come on, Fang, we’re going for a walk.” Harry said resolutely, patting his leg and Fang bounced happily out of the house behind them, dashing to the edge of the forest. “Lumos!” He mumbled, lighting the tip of his wand and hearing Ron’s groan as he found a faint trail of spiders leading a path into the darkness.

They walked behind the spiders for about twenty minutes, not speaking, and listening hard for noises other than breaking twigs and rustling leaves. Then, when the trees had become thicker than ever, so that the stars overhead were no longer visible, and Harry’s wand shone alone in the sea of dark, they saw their spider guides leaving the path.

Harry’s heart sunk lower as he paused, trying to see where the spiders were going, but everything outside his little sphere of light was pitch-black. He had never been this deep into the forest before. He could vividly remember Hagrid advising him not to leave the path the last time he’d been in here. But Hagrid was miles away now, probably sitting in a cell in Azkaban, and he had also said to follow the spiders.

Something wet touched Harry’s hand and he jumped backwards, crushing Ron’s foot, but it was only Fang’s nose.

But what if it hadn’t been? What if they had been found out by a creature? What if there was a werewolf sniffling their scared scents right now? – Harry had not thought to check if it was a full moon.

His hand started sweating as his grip on his wand trembled. Maybe they should have let Lady Nott take care of the issue. Maybe, if something were to happen to Nott, then she would come, and her rage would have been so terrifying that the heir would bow at her feet and desperately apologise for all the damage caused.

With his mouth dry, Harry turned to Ron, whose eyes he could just make out reflecting the light of his wand, “What do you reckon?”

“We’ve come this far.” Ron said.

Harry didn’t voice his concern.

Now even Ron was braver than him.

So, they followed the darting shadows of spiders into the trees. They couldn’t move very quickly now; there were tree roots and stumps in their way, barely visible in the neat blackness. Harry could feel Fang’s hot breath on his hand. More than once, they had to stop, so that Harry could crouch down and find the spiders once more.

More than once he thought about claiming to have lost them, but he did not think he could ever deal with the shame. He would be reminded of his cowardice whenever he saw Nott and Malfoy strolling carelessly – bravely unconcerned – through the hallways.

They walked for what seemed like at least half an hour more, their robes snagging on low-slung branches and brambles. After a while, they noticed that the ground seemed to be sloping downward, though the trees continued thicker than a troll’s skull.

Then Fang suddenly let loose a great, echoing bark, making both Harry and Ron jump out of their skins.

“What?” Ron asked loudly, looking around into the pitch-dark, and gripping Harry’s elbow very hard.

At least they were both fazed, Harry supposed.

“There’s something moving over there.” He breathed. “Listen… sounds like something big…”

They listened. Some distance away, to their right, something big was snapping branches as it carved a path through the trees.

“Oh, no.” Ron whispered with a note of naked desperation. “Oh, no, oh, no, oh, no…”

“Shut up!” Harry hissed frantically. “It’ll hear you! Shut up!”

“Hear me?!” Ron exclaimed with an unnaturally high voice as he stared at him as if Harry was helplessly stupid. “It’s already heard Fang! Great idea bringing him, Harry! Great, great idea! Why didn’t we just invite Nott to annoy a werewolf into eating us for dinner?!”

The darkness seemed to be pressing on their eyeballs as they stood, terrified, and dumbly waiting. Harry knew no spells. Ron’s wand was useless because it was broken, and Harry’s because neither of them had thought about researching a single protection spell. Neither of them had even considered bringing a broom for a quick escape.

What were they thinking?! Harry couldn’t even come up with a reason. Being noble was not enough. And the scar on his forehead would mean nothing for a mindless beast. A mindless beast would not stop to gape at Harry Potter and thank him for vanquishing Lord Voldemort.

“W-What do you think it’s doing?” Harry asked shakily.

“Probably getting ready to pounce.” Ron replied – unhelpfully.

They waited, paralysed, shivering, hardly daring to move.

“Do you think it’s gone?” Harry whispered.

“Dunno –” Before Ron could finish the thought, a sudden blaze of light came from their right, so bright in the darkness that both of them flung up their hands to shield their eyes. Fang yelped and tried to run, but got lodged in a tangle of thorns, yelping even louder.

“Harry!” Ron shouted, his voice breaking with barely contained relief. “Harry, it’s dad’s car!”

“What?”

“Come on!”

Harry blundered after Ron toward the light, stumbling and tripping, and a moment later they had emerged into a clearing.

Mr. Weasley’s car was standing, empty, in the middle of a circle of thick trees under a roof of dense branches, its headlights ablaze. As Ron walked, open-mouthed, toward it, it moved slowly to him, exactly like a large, turquoise dog greeting its long-lost owner.

“It’s been here all this time!” Ron exclaimed delightedly, his tone betraying childish glee which had momentarily swallowed his fear, and walked around the car with the same bewilderment that his father inspected anything Muggle. “The forest’s turned it wild…”

The sides of the car were scratched and smeared with mud. Apparently, it had taken to trundling around the forest on its own. Fang didn’t seem at all keen on it; he kept close to Harry, who could feel him quivering. His breathing slowing down again, Harry stuffed his wand back into his robes.

“And you thought it was going to attack us!” Ron said mockingly as he patted the car, purposefully forgetting his own terror mere moments ago. Harry said nothing, though, figuring that his and Ron’s pride being at odds with each other would be just like what the forest wanted. “I wondered where it had gone! Do you reckon I can take it back with us? Dad spent a ton-lot of gold to buy this from a fellow of his! Mom raged at him for ages, she did. They had to borrow some gold from Bill to buy school supplies that year.”

Harry left Ron talking to himself, blocking the flicker of blame he felt at being reminded of Mrs. Weasley’s screaming letter to Ron. She had not found Harry guilty, then, even though it had been all his fault. Dobby had closed the passage so Harry wouldn’t get to Hogwarts. And Harry had been so terrified of being expelled that he had suggested they went by themselves.

He had never pointed out what a stupid idea that was when Ron reluctantly mentioned the car.

Harry squinted around on the floodlit ground for signs of more spiders, but they had all scuttled away from the glare of the headlights. He shut the small part of himself that was happy at the news – the same part which made returning to school with the knowledge that they had tried all the more appealing to him.

But then Harry pictured Nott there, in the same situation he was in…

He could see Nott and Malfoy kicking the car to see how it would react to provocation. He could picture the two Slytherins doing some kind of spell that Harry didn’t know to clear their path through the thick trees. And Harry could picture Nott smirking as he hexed the spiders fluorescent so they would shine in the darkness.

Theo Nott would have not backed down, if only because he would have relished the thrill of exploring the Forbidden Forest when it was the scariest.

“We’ve lost the trail.” Harry noticed the obvious. “Come on, let’s go find it again.”

Ron didn’t speak – neither to contradict Harry nor to agree with him. Harry was about to snap at his friend for not moving when he realised that his eyes were fixed on a point some ten feet above the forest floor, right behind where Harry was standing.

Ron’s freckled face was livid with terror.

Harry didn’t have time to turn around when an unnervingly loud noise sounded and he felt something long and hairy seize him around the middle and lift him off the ground, making him hang facedown. Struggling, terrified – and filled to the brim with bitter regret for letting Nott get to him so easily – he heard more clicking and saw Ron’s legs leave the ground, too.

Fang was whimpering and howling – yelping helplessly as he, too, was swept away into the dark trees.

Head hanging, Harry saw that what had a hold of him was marching on six immensely long, hairy legs, the front clutching him tightly below a pair of shining black pincers. Behind him, he could hear another of the creatures, no doubt carrying Ron. They were moving into the very heart of the forest. Harry could hear Fang fighting to free himself from a third monster, whining loudly, but Harry couldn’t have yelled even if he had wanted to.

He seemed to have left his voice and his strength back at the clearing. This monster… it had deprived Harry of all the determination to best Nott that he had left.

Nott. The Slytherin would have attempted a spell to free himself and his best friend. Nott’s big mouth would have uttered atrocities to their captors. He would have invoked the forbidden name of his mother to put fear in the hearts of the beasts daring to treat him like their weak prey.

And Malfoy would have rolled his eyes at the boisterous barks of his friend. He would have called ‘Theo’ a stupid prick as he charmed the monster with a silver tongue and silky whispers of all the creature wanted to hear.

One of them was lazily chaotic. The other one wickedly composed.

The two of them were dangerous.

In comparison, Ron and Harry were two deadweights, motionlessly being carried to their deaths.

He never knew how long he was in the creature’s clutches; he only knew that the darkness suddenly lifted enough for him to see that the leaf-strewn ground was now swarming with spiders. Craning his neck sideways, he realised that they had reached the ridge of a vast hollow. A hollow that had been cleared of trees, so that the stars shone brightly onto the worst scene Harry had ever laid eyes on.

Spiders.

Not tiny spiders like those surging over the leaves below. Spiders the size of carthorses, eight-eyed, eight-legged, black, hairy… gigantic. The massive specimen that was carrying Harry made its way down the steep slope toward a misty, domed web in the very centre of the hollow, while its fellows closed in all around it, clicking their pincers excitedly at the sight of its load.

Harry fell to the ground on all fours as the spider released him. Ron and Fang thudded down next to him. Fang wasn’t howling anymore, but cowering silently on the spot while Ron looked exactly like Harry felt.

His mouth was stretched wide in a kind of silent scream and his eyes were popping.

Harry averted his eyes, then, being reminded that Ron’s fear was more than a phobia. His friend had been traumatised when he was a child. Traumatised by the twins when they transfigured Ron’s favourite toy into a giant spider when he was barely three years old as their sick idea of a prank.

And Harry had dragged Ron with him because he had been afraid to come alone. He had dragged Ron along to prove to himself that he was no lesser than Nott.

Maybe he was, though. Because he couldn’t imagine the same boy who had run into the Quidditch pitch under a torrent rain and faced a bewitched Bludger to protect his friend would have ever done to Malfoy what Harry had done to Ron.

Ron had been reluctant from the beginning, and Harry had made it sound as if it was their obligation to come. He had made it sound as if Ron would be lesser than him for refusing to come.

And Harry now knew just how poisonously powerful ego could be.

It took him a while to realise that the spider that had dropped him was saying something. It had been hard to tell because it clicked its pincers with every word it spoke.

“Aragog!” The spider called. “Aragog!”

From the middle of the misty, domed web, a spider the size of a small elephant emerged very slowly. There was grey in the black of his body and legs, and each of the eyes on his ugly, pincered head was milky white. Aragog was blind.

“What is it?” He asked, clicking his pincers rapidly.

“Men.” The spider who had caught Harry clicked.

“Is it Hagrid?” Aragog inquired, moving quietly as his eight milky eyes wandered vaguely.

“Strangers.” The spider who brought Ron replied.

“Kill them.” Aragog clicked fretfully. “I was sleeping…”

“We’re friends of Hagrid’s!” Harry shouted, his reactions finally returning to him as his heart seemingly left his chest in order to pound in his throat.

Click, click, click…

All the spiders around the hollow clicked their pincers furiously as Aragog paused.

“Hagrid has never sent men into our hollow before.” He said slowly, and Harry had to swallow as he recognised the dubious tone coming from something that was not human.

“Hagrid’s in trouble.” He explained, breathing fast as he fought to keep his voice steady. “That’s why we’ve come.”

“In trouble?” The aged spider repeated lowly, and Harry swore he could hear faint concern beneath the clicking pincers. “But why has he sent you?”

Harry thought of getting to his feet but decided against it; he didn’t think his legs would support him. So, he spoke from the ground, as calmly as he could muster.

“They think, up at the school, that Hagrid’s been setting a – a – something on the students. They’ve taken him to Azkaban.”

Aragog clicked his pincers in fury, and all around the hollow, the sound was echoed by the crowd of spiders. It was like a round of applause, except that applause didn’t usually make Harry feel sick with escalating fear.

“But that was years ago.” Aragog said fretfully. “Years and years ago. I remember it well. That’s why they made him leave the school. They believed that I was the monster that dwells in what they call the Chamber of Secrets. They thought that Hagrid had opened the Chamber and set me free.”

“And you… you didn’t come from the Chamber of Secrets?” Harry asked faintly, cold sweat on his forehead.

Hagrid had really been innocent all along. A small part of Harry had regretfully – shamefully – always thought it somewhat plausible, that Hagrid had been unwillingly behind the attacks. It had sounded like something he would do – open a forbidden doorway to a chamber none was supposed to walk into, and befriend the beast resting within, not knowing the danger he was unleashing.

“I!” Aragog clicked louder, more angrily. “I was not born in the castle. I come from a distant land. A traveller gave me to Hagrid when I was an egg. Hagrid was only a boy, then, but he cared for me, hidden in a cupboard in the castle, feeding me on scraps from the table. Hagrid is my good friend and a good man. When I was discovered by that… that unholy boy who blamed me for the death of a girl, Hagrid protected me. I have lived here in the forest ever since, where Hagrid still visits me. He even found me a wife, Mosag, and you see how our family has grown, all through Hagrid’s goodness…”

Harry summoned whatever had remained of his fleeting courage.

“An unholy boy?” He asked tentatively. “D-Do you mean… Could you possible mean Tom Riddle?”

“We do not speak of the devil here, friend of Hagrid’s.” Aragog spoke in a threatening hiss, and Harry heard Ron angrily whining his name. “Such wickedness is not welcomed amongst my own. The devil roams this land still, he does. The most gruesome kind of creature to ever walk the Wizarding World. A creature born for wickedness, incapable of remorse. An unholy boy whose soul should have not survived the darkness splitting it.”

Harry felt his mouth drying at that. Who was Tom Riddle? He wanted so desperately to know. He wanted so desperately to be able to understand the riddled words Aragog hissed, but Harry feared he was running increasingly out of time as the spiders started to hungrily close in on him and Ron.

Harry summoned what little still remained of his courage, “So you never –” he swallowed dryly as Aragog focused those unnervingly white eyes on him, “never attacked anyone?”

“Never.” Aragog croaked. “It would have been my instinct, but out of respect for Hagrid, I never harmed a human. The body of the girl who was killed was discovered in a bathroom. I never saw any part of the castle but the cupboard in which I grew up. Our kind likes the dark and the quiet…”

“But then… Do you know what did kill that girl?” Harry asked tentatively, growing frustrated despite the paralysing fear stubbornly refusing to dissipate. Hagrid’s advice… it served him very little if Aragog was unwilling to speak about Tom Riddle – the one who had set Harry on this path; the one whose intelligence had been repeatedly praised as he unravelled the mystery none other could. And it would serve him even less if Aragog continued to talk in circles, offering Harry no solid answers to the questions roaming his head. “Because whatever it is, it’s back and attacking people again –”

His words were drowned by a loud outbreak of clicking and the rustling of many long legs shifting angrily; large black shapes shifted all around him.

“The thing that lives in the castle,” Aragog started, “is an ancient creature we spiders fear above all others. Well do I remember how I pleaded with Hagrid to let me go, when I sensed the beast moving about the school.”

“What is it?” Harry asked him more urgently.

He regretted as the loud clicking became deafeningly louder, and the spiders seemed to close in more.

“We do not speak of it!” Aragog hissed fiercely. “We do not name it! I never even told Hagrid the name of that dread creature, though he asked me, many times.”

Harry thought about protesting before he noticed Aragog slowly retreating. The only civilised creature there, the one whose respect for Hagrid seemed to prevail, was slowly leaving them be with a bunch of his spawns. Spawns that appeared mercilessly hungry as they inched towards Harry and Ron.

“We’ll just go, then.” He called desperately to Aragog, hearing only leaves rustling behind him.

“Go?” Aragog said slowly, almost in a disinterested yawn. “I think not…”

“But – but –”

“My sons and daughters do not harm Hagrid, on my command. But I cannot deny them fresh meat when it wanders so willingly into our midst. Goodbye, friend of Hagrid.”

Harry spun around terrified. Feet away, towering above him, was a solid wall of spiders, clicking, their many eyes gleaming in their ugly black heads. Even as he reached for his wand out of instinct, Harry knew it was no good. There were too many of them, but as he tried to stand, ready to at least die fighting, a loud, long note sounded, and a blaze of light flamed through the hollow.

Mr. Weasley’s car was thundering down the slope, headlights glaring, its horn screeching, knocking spiders aside; several were thrown onto their backs, their endless legs waving in the air. The car screeched to a halt in front of Harry and Ron and the doors flew open.

“Get Fang!” Harry yelled, diving into the front seat; Ron seized the boarhound around the middle and threw him, yelping, into the back of the car. The doors slammed shut and Ron didn’t need to touch the accelerator as the engine roared and they were off, hitting more spiders as they sped up the slope and out of the hollow. They were soon crashing through the forest, branches whipping the windows as the car wound its way cleverly through the widest gaps, following a path it obviously knew.

Harry looked sideways at Ron. His mouth was still open in a silent scream, but his eyes at least weren’t popping anymore.

“Are you okay?” Harry asked his best friend tentatively, but Ron just kept staring straight ahead, unable to speak – or unwilling to.

Harry felt his hands sweating in nervousness as he detected the slightest sign of anger behind Ron’s terror. He said nothing to relieve the situation, though. He didn’t try to lighten the mood or excuse his insistence on making Ron face his trauma.

He knew it would be no effect. And he knew it was not the right thing to do.

They smashed their way through the undergrowth, Fang howling loudly in the back seat, and Harry saw the side mirror snap off as they squeezed past a large oak. After ten noisy, rocky minutes, the trees thinned, and Harry could again see patches of the sky.

The car stopped so suddenly that they were nearly thrown into the windshield. They had reached the edge of the forest. Fang flung himself at the window in his anxiety to get out, and when Harry opened the door, he shot off through the trees to Hagrid’s house, tail between his legs. Harry got out, too, and after a minute or so, Ron seemed to regain the feeling in his limbs enough to follow, still stiff-necked and only staring. Harry gave the car a grateful pat as it reversed back into the forest and disappeared from view.

Harry went back into Hagrid’s cabin to get the Invisibility Cloak to find Fang trembling under a blanket in his basket. When Harry got outside again, he found Ron being violently sick in the pumpkin patch.

“Follow the spiders.” Ron hissed weakly, wiping his mouth on his sleeve. “I’ll never forgive Hagrid. We’re lucky to be alive.”

“I bet he thought Aragog wouldn’t hurt friends of his.” Harry tried lamely.

“That’s exactly Hagrid’s problem!” Ron screamed, thumping the wall of the cabin. “He always thinks monsters aren’t as bad as they’re made out to be and look where it’s got him! A cell in Azkaban!” He was shivering uncontrollably now, and Harry looked down so as to not seem like he was judging. And to give Ron the privacy to rant and be sick as much as he needed to. “Nott and Malfoy were right for once! Dumbledore is loony if he thinks it’s safe to keep Hagrid here – at a school! He might not have opened the chamber, but he did bring all sorts of foul creatures to the castle, didn’t he?! Bloody giant spiders, feeding on humans! What was the point of even sending us there?! The Ministry won’t accept the testimony of a blind spider!”

“Now we know that Hagrid never opened the Chamber of Secrets.” Harry said quietly, throwing the cloak over Ron and prodding him in the arm to make him walk slowly back inside. “He was innocent.”

Ron gave a loud snort at that. Evidently, hatching Aragog in a cupboard wasn’t his idea of being innocent – and Harry didn’t know how to deny that.

As the castle loomed nearer, Harry twitched the cloak to make sure their feet were hidden, then pushed the creaking front doors ajar. They walked carefully back across the entrance hall and up the marble staircase, holding their breath as they passed corridors where watchful sentries were walking. At last, they reached the safety of the Gryffindor common room, where the fire had burned itself into glowing ash. They took off the cloak and climbed the winding stair to their dormitory.

Ron fell onto his bed without bothering to get undressed. Harry, however, didn’t feel very sleepy. He sat at the edge of his fourposter, thinking hard about everything Aragog had said – and how close he had come to death.

Harry was lucky, he realised. More lucky than talented. He would have died had the car not appeared. Died a pitiful death as his corpse would have been found defenceless despite the wand loosely dangling from his lifeless grip.

Harry swung his legs up onto his bed and leaned back against the pillows, watching the moon glinting at him through the tower window.

He couldn’t see what else they could do. They had hit dead ends everywhere. Riddle had caught the wrong person. The Heir of Slytherin had gotten off, and no one could tell whether it was the same person, or a different one, who had opened the Chamber this time. There was nobody else to ask. Harry laid down, still thinking about what Aragog had said.

What would Nott do, had he been in Harry’s shows – knowing what Harry now knew? What would Malfoy do? Who would Nott spy on? Who would they maybe torture for information? Which poor soul would Malfoy use his silver tongue to manipulate?

He was becoming drowsy when what seemed like their very last clue occurred to him, and he suddenly sat bolt upright.

“Ron!” He hissed through the dark. “Ron!”

Ron woke with a yelp like Fang’s, stared wildly around, and saw Harry. He sulked hard, but Harry started to speak before his friend could think to open his mouth to bash him.

“Ron – the girl who died. Aragog said she was found in a bathroom.” Harry said urgently. “What if she never left the bathroom? What if she’s still there?”

Ron rubbed his eyes, frowning through the moonlight. And then he understood, too.

“You don’t think – not Moaning Myrtle?”

Harry just nodded his head, “It would make sense, wouldn’t it?” He asked no one in particular. “I mean – it must have been something terrible for her to become a ghost. And everything seems to lead there, doesn’t it?”

“But, Harry, the teachers.” Ron said. “Don’t you think one of them would think to ask Myrtle?”

Harry considered it, but then he shook his head, determined to prove his point. Feeling it in his gut that he was right. “She wouldn’t be cooperative. She gets all weird when she talks about death. And it is not the teacher’s attention that she wants.”

“You can’t mean – Nott and Malfoy?”

“I think they know.” Harry stated with finality. “I think they must have figured it out ages ago, by the time they pretended to befriend her. And I think they told Nott’s mom everything. How else would she have enough ground to shut down the school? She must know something no one can fight her on.”

“That’s a lot of ‘ifs’, Harry.” Ron commented quietly. “How are we even going to talk with her now? We are never alone, and Myrtle hates us – thanks Hermione for that.” He mumbled as an afterthought.

Harry ignored the jib, “Then we have to dodge the teachers.” He said. “Tomorrow.”

Chapter Text

Previous Chapter:

“Ron!” He hissed through the dark. “Ron!”

Ron woke with a yelp like Fang’s, stared wildly around, and saw Harry. He sulked hard, but Harry started to speak before his friend could think to open his mouth to bash him.

“Ron – the girl who died. Aragog said she was found in a bathroom.” Harry said urgently. “What if she never left the bathroom? What if she’s still there?”

Ron rubbed his eyes, frowning through the moonlight. And then he understood, too.

“You don’t think – not Moaning Myrtle?”

Harry just nodded his head, “It would make sense, wouldn’t it?” He asked no one in particular. “I mean – it must have been something terrible for her to become a ghost. And everything seems to lead there, doesn’t it?”

“But, Harry, the teachers.” Ron said. “Don’t you think one of them would think to ask Myrtle?”

Harry considered it, but then he shook his head, determined to prove his point. Feeling it in his gut that he was right. “She wouldn’t be cooperative. She gets all weird when she talks about death. And it is not the teacher’s attention that she wants.”

“You can’t mean – Nott and Malfoy?”

“I think they know.” Harry stated with finality. “I think they must have figured it out ages ago, by the time they pretended to befriend her. And I think they told Nott’s mom everything. How else would she have enough ground to shut down the school? She must know something no one can fight her on.”

“That’s a lot of ‘ifs’, Harry.” Ron commented quietly. “How are we even going to talk with her now? We are never alone, and Myrtle hates us – thanks Hermione for that.” He mumbled as an afterthought.

Harry ignored the jab, “Then we have to dodge the teachers.” He said. “Tomorrow.”

Harry had barely noticed the time ticking by that particular year.

Not that the year before had been particularly tranquil, but it had certainly been… more. More entertaining. More exciting. More magical. More enjoyable. It had been more – it hadn’t passed in the short blink of an eye and left him feeling uselessly hollow as he dwelled on what he had accomplished the past nine months.

Nothing – that’s what he had accomplished. What he had done.

A buttload of nothing.

Harry just thought he had more time to fix it now that realisation had finally hit him. But the calendar showed him June, and McGonagall had reminded them that, unlike the year before, exams had not been mercifully cancelled.

There had been protests, of course. There had been desperation-fuelled outrage as those who hadn’t bothered to show up at the Hospital Wing to even pay their respect to the petrified suddenly felt staggered with sympathy. So filled with solidarity for the victims that they demanded at least the postponement of the final exams.

McGonagall had been stoically unimpressed, and her arched eyebrow had stopped Harry’s tongue before he could even think to vehemently agree with Seamus when his roommate cried out against the unfairness.

“Exams?!” He had howled, barely noticing when Neville’s shock caused him to vanish one of the legs of his desk, and Nott laughed so hard tears rolled down his face while Malfoy fixed the damage with a roll of his eyes. Harry felt dread at that – he wouldn’t have known how even to vanish the damn leg, much less restore it from thin air. “How is it fair that we’re still getting exams?!”

“Fifteen points to Slytherin, Mr Malfoy – astounding precision and spell reaction time.” McGonagall had held up a finger before Nott could mock-cheer his blushing housemate. “Minus five points for the deplorable attitude, Theo. Tease Mr Longbottom one more time, and you will be patrolling the hallways with me tonight. And,” she had hissed before Nott could retort, “the whole point of keeping the school open at this time is for you to receive your education. The exams will therefore take place as usual, and I trust you are all revising hard.”

Her stern look and aggressive accent had been directed at her own House – and Harry gulped just as Ron hid his crooked wand under his robes.

Apart from a piece of knowledge about Mandrakes, he had learned nothing that year. Nine months of nothing. Nine months strutting the hallways of the castle, not missing a single assignment and taking notes under Professor Snape’s glare… all for nothing.

He had sat there, in that Transfiguration classroom, surrounded by magical boards filled with formulas he couldn’t read and squeaking animals he couldn’t begin to transfigure into something else, and looked down in shame when not a single spell came to mind. When not a single fraction of magical theory filled the void space in his mind, that only grew bigger the harder he tried to come up with something.

He could see the same hollow dread twisting his best friend’s features and hear the same desperation in the gasps of the Gryffindors around him.

“But…” Lila Brown had stuttered, wincing when their professor’s stance dared her to continue. She did after gulping, though her voice sounded as weak as the chirping of a newborn bird, “last year… Professor Dumbledore called off the exams. He –”

“He did it so his Golden Boy and his trope wouldn’t be the first First Years in the history of Hogwarts to fail the easiest grade.” Malfoy had snickered, loud enough for everyone to hear inside the silent classroom, though quietly enough for him to claim not to have meant it.

Nott’s loud bark of a laugh didn’t have the same tact, though, as silver eyes winked at Ron’s reddening face.

McGonagall had just sighed, not even trying to reprimand them – or correct them, “Minus five points for Slytherin.” She had said before resuming her lesson as if she had never been interrupted in the first place.

The food in his mouth tasted like dry, hot sand as he chewed it mechanically. Harry stared at the perfectly round pancakes with the inviting chocolate chips and didn’t even feel the familiar urge to pile them on his plate. In fact, the only sound of clicking cutlery came from Ron next to him. The rest of the Lions and the majority of the Great Hall shared his gloom as, for the first time in weeks, Harry heard pages turning and quills desperately working on parchment as those who still had hope started their revision a few months too late to even feed the hope of passing with good enough grades.

As Ron poured four more spoons of porridge on a plate already flooded with crumbs and smeared it with an ocean of syrup, Harry supposed that his best friend was trying to eat their problems away.

Harry turned wide eyes to the front of the Hall when McGonagall loudly cleared her throat, calling everyone’s wishful attention and pleading glances, “I have news.” She announced and, for the first time since Filch’s cat was petrified, her lips were not crisped into her skull, and her knuckles were not white clenching her skirts. No, there was actually the hint of a small smile on her face…

“The exams were cancelled!” A hopeful Hufflepuff dared guess while a small boy crossed his fingers next to him.

“Dumbledore is coming back!” Several others shot their shot into the Great Hall, while others clapped their hands together and shouted, “You’ve caught the Heir!”

McGonagall’s lips did crisp, though, as her attempts to regain speech were interrupted by wilder and wilder guesses, ranging from Wood’s misplaced priorities of “Quidditch matches are back on!” to Nott’s lazily drawled snicker of “Granger finally died!”

“Theo!” Professor McGonagall hissed through gritted teeth, glaring at the Slytherin blowing her a kiss – completely unafraid. She regained her composure when Snape loudly cleared his throat, staring at Nott with some kind of… horrific clearance before he shook his head and demanded his House to quit it, “Professor Sprout has informed me that the Mandrakes are ready for cutting at last. Tonight, we will be able to revive those people who have been petrified. I need hardly remind you all that one of them may well be able to tell us who, or what, attacked them. I am hopeful that this dreadful year will end with our catching the culprit.”

The explosion of cheering took a second too long to begin, Harry noticed. He had time to look around himself, frowning as a few students started clapping before the others carefully joined in.

That startled him – that the others were careful. That they were almost… hesitant.

Perhaps out of habit, or perhaps because it was undeniable even to his ego that the Slytherins always seemed to be one step ahead, Harry stole a glance at Nott and Malfoy among their peers. They were both oddly calm. And they weirdly had no snarky comment to add when McGonagall finished.

No, Malfoy just nodded reassuringly at a blonde Slytherin girl who sought him with her eyes while Nott smirked. Not at Harry. Not at the few Muggle Borns who were visibly slacking in relief. At Professor McGonagall. Theo Nott smirked at their professor with the same lazy grace that he did everything else. To Harry’s shock, McGonagall played his game by smirking back.

It was just for a second. In a blink, it was gone and back was his stoic Transfiguration professor. But Harry had seen it. He had caught it with his own two eyes. And it was undeniable that, while she stood in the golden pedestal where the headmaster usually delivered his speeches, behind the metal owl which rested far too peacefully for a pet without its master, she had smirked back.

It was not like McGonagall wanted the students to continue petrified. Not like she wanted Hermione dead like her protégé. Despite not agreeing with her preferences, Harry knew her professor to have unbendable integrity. If her personality wasn’t enough to determine that, then her House was enough proof.

The Head of Gryffindor, she was.

But that smirk…

Harry played McGonagall’s words back in his mind and, with his head painfully blank, he turned to Ron while his friend drooled the porridge he had stuffed into his mouth, “Do you reckon there was something weird with McGonagall’s speech?”

Ron just shrugged, face wincing when he swallowed far too much food for his throat to pipe down without burning, “She can’t be happy with the timing.” His best friend suggested off-handedly, “With Dumbledore gone, she has to deal with everything herself – including the Governors. Adding up exams and taking care of all the petrified and their worried families won’t be a walk in the park.”

“I guess…” Harry trailed off. It did make sense, he supposed. But it didn’t quite fit. McGonagall’s words, her smirk – that reasoning wouldn’t explain why Nott and Malfoy of all people would somehow be in the loop of whatever it was that the professors were now hiding. “It’s just… don’t you reckon her speech sounded like, like some kind of warning? Like she was… threatening us or something?”

“Why the hell would she, Harry?” Ron asked that very good question.

Why would she?

Harry couldn’t really come up with a good enough answer.

“Maybe,” he started, eyeing the Slytherins once more. How calm they all were – not appeased and no longer on edge. Nott, too, was weirdly subdued and, Harry noticed with a startle, that the green and silver tie was properly tied around his neck, his white shirt buttoned up to the very last bottom and his long hair tamed on top of his head. He was presentable. As presentable as he had been that day in Diagon Alley when Harry first saw Ravenna Nott proudly looking down at whoever crossed her path, “maybe she knows, Ron.”

“Know what?” Ron asked him obliviously, trying to fit yet another piece of sausage in his stuffed mouth.

Harry kept himself from rolling his eyes too loudly as, afraid the Slytherins would somehow hear him, he lowered his voice to a whisper, “Maybe she knows about the Chamber. About Myrtle, that Riddle caught the wrong guy and who the real heir is. I just… do you really think none of the professors would figure any of this out?”

“I-I…” Ron swallowed painfully again, “I suppose whoever is behind this could’ve taken her speech as a threat – like you said. I mean, I guess I’d be spooked if I had anything to do with this mess. But still, Harry,” his best friend lowered his tone, too, eyeing McGonagall with such suspicion that Harry wondered if Ron perhaps thought their professor was behind this, “if she did know, wouldn’t she have done something more? Other than a… a hidden, riddled threat, I mean? This place would be swarming with people if McGonagall had even an inkling of who their heir is or where the monster is. Dumbledore and Hagrid would be back for sure if that was the case, wouldn’t they?”

“I-I don’t know. I guess?” Harry flinched at how pathetic he sounded even to his own ears. “Still… her speech was weird. And everyone’s reaction, Ron – something is not adding up. The professors have to know something, maybe they have a lead…”

“Dunno, Harry.” Half-chewed scrambled eggs flew out of Ron’s mouth when he spoke, and, realising that he was the only one so bothered, Harry wondered if he was just being stupid. If he was fixating on the Slytherins and seeing what he wanted to see, like he had accused Hermione of doing. That was enough to make him stop. Hermione had gone down that path and ended up petrified. Harry certainly didn’t want to be the next. “Good news is that now we don’t have to talk with bloody Myrtle. That annoying freak gives me goosebumps.”

“Still think we should go to Myrtle, Ron.” Harry pointed out, not wanting to sound like he was giving a command, but giving one nonetheless. His best friend scowled darkly, but he finally nodded before thrusting his fork back into his mouth. “At least to know what Nott and Malfoy wanted with her.”

Predictably, screwing over the Slytherins brought the willingness back to Ron’s features as his next nod came drenched in enthusiasm.

Harry was still watching the Snakes picking their breakfast on the other side of the Great Hall when Ginny Weasley just appeared between him and Ron. He swallowed uncomfortably at her proximity and, when before his ambition was to simply observe, he now used the Slytherins as a refuge for his attention.

The only Weasley girl was as pale as a ghost, her many, many freckles looking like the ugly pimples reminiscent of Dragon Pox and wide, glassy doe eyes stared frantically up and down the Gryffindor table, rocking herself with the nervous stillness of someone stuck in a trance. She looked like she had been crying. No, bawling her eyes out if the inflamed skin underneath her eyelids was any indication. When she spoke next, her voice was rough, scraped.

As if she had recently been screaming.

“I’ve got to tell you something.” Ron’s sister mumbled to him, carefully not looking at Harry. Not even touching his side on the cramped bench. A stark contrast to the little girl who used to skip after him and write him embarrassing lyrics as a way to draw his attention to her.

In a very unlike Ron fashion, Harry’s best friend pushed away his plate before finishing and hugged Ginny by her shoulders, letting go as if burned when she swatted him away.

“Ginny,” Ron gasped, “you’re freezing cold! We should take you to the Hospital Wing.”

Harry’s interest surpassed his general discomfort whenever Ginny Weasley was around when the girl narrowed her eyes. It looked mean. Or it would have looked mean if she hadn’t shaken her head like a toddler desperate to extend its bedtime by five minutes. Desperate to be kept away from the Hospital Wing despite the deadly ill quality her complexion had acquired.

He wondered, then, if maybe he should have given his best friend and his brothers more credit the few times they had discussed Ginny. If maybe he shouldn’t have so promptly agreed with Mr and Mrs Weasley when they let the guilt of Ginny’s weird behaviour fall to the Slytherins and assured them that nothing could ever happen under Dumbledore’s careful tutelage.

He had just wanted to keep the youngest Weasley away from him, though. Kept her fidgeting, drooling, embarrassingly worshipping self as far away from him as she could possibly go.

But now, as he watched her panic escalating the longer McGonagall stood there, reassuring the few who had come to speak with her, the more he considered that maybe he was wrong, and he was not the only reason why Ginny Weasley was so fidgety and easily spooked...

“Is it something about the Chamber of Secrets?” He leaned forward and spoke to her quietly, intending for not even Ron to hear it. But for once in a breakfast feast, his best friend was not more interested in the food piled up in front of him. Ron tried to shush him, to bring Ginny closer to his side, but Harry ignored him easily enough. “Have you seen something? Nott and Malfoy – have you seen them doing something? Are they threatening you? Is this why you’ve been acting so weird since the first attack?”

“Quit it, Harry!” Ron hissed at him, but Ginny was now getting red in the face. Not for embarrassment, he didn’t think. It wasn’t the same rosy tinge she got when she discovered Harry sitting calmly in her kitchen during the summer.

It was bright red, starting low in her neck and staining the rest of her face slowly while her head turned maniacally to him. Harry swore he saw the pupils within those doe eyes slitting before Percy chose that moment to drop a heavy, wan hand on his sister’s shoulder.

“If you’ve finished eating, I’ll take that seat, Ginny.” He saw tiredly, the dark bags under his eyes almost as dark as the ones adorning his sister’s, “I’m starving, I’ve only just come off patrol duty.”

The slits in her eyes were gone just as fast as they appeared and, once more, Ginny Weasley had turned back into the skittish, twitchy mice that reminded Harry an awful lot of Dobby. She jumped up as though her spot had just been electrified and, after giving Percy a fleeting, frightening look, she scarpered away. Ron followed her with his gaze, glaring at his yawning older brother and at Harry when Ginny never once looked back upon having her name called out.

“Well done, you two.” He mumbled. “Bloody well done. Now she won’t ever tell me what’s been bothering her.”

“We still have Myrtle.” Harry replied with a shrug. “I bet what she has to say is more important than whatever Ginny might have seen. I mean,” he tried to correct with a wince when Ron’s neck snapped back at him, “whoever the heir is, he is careful enough to have escaped everyone’s notice. I don’t think Ginny…”

“You don’t even know if what she was about to say has anything to do with the bloody Chamber.” Ron went back to the pancakes – where his focus remained for the rest of their meal as he gladly ignored every lame attempt at conversation that Harry could come up with.

“We’ll just… be on the lookout for an opportunity to sneak into Myrtle’s bathroom.” Harry said to his best friend’s profile when a Hufflepuff Prefect came to escort them to the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom with the rest of the First Years.

He received the silent treatment for the entire period. Ron didn’t even cave in order to mock Lockhart’s dishevelled appearance and dull hair. Apparently, their professor hadn’t even had time to spell his teeth into shining whenever he smiled. He seemed glad when the lesson ended and, Harry bet, he would use his free time in front of a mirror before his next class.

“Mark my words,” Lockhart said while he led them to History of Magic, ungently ushering them around the corner, “the first words out of those poor petrified people’s mouths will be ‘it was Hagrid’. Frankly, I’m astounded Professor McGonagall thinks all these security measures are necessary.”

Harry had his eyes in mid-roll when a voice that sounded awfully like Nott’s called him stupid inside his head. This – this was the chance he had spent days waiting for. It was fitting that it was delivered in a silver platter by a fool as big as Lockhart.

“I agree, sir.” He said promptly, mouthing at Ron to go with it when his best friend dumbly dropped his books in surprise.

“Thank you, Harry.” Lockhart said obliviously, his smile a lot less impressive without that obnoxious spark shining bright at its corner, “I mean, we teachers have quite enough to be getting on with, without walking students to classes and standing guard all night…”

“That’s right!” Ron finally caught up, a little too loudly and too enthusiastically. Harry had to resist the urge to facepalm. Neither of them would ever win any prizes for their acting skills, but Harry supposed that his lie could have at least been considered minimally smooth. Ron just seemed pained to be agreeing with their professor, “Why don’t you leave us here, sir, we’ve only got one more corridor to go.”

Thankfully, Lockhart was too thick to notice that Ron sounded strangled.

“You know, Weasley, I think I will.” He said mid-yawn, using his reflex on a suit of armour to try – and fail – to fix the knot that had become the curl of his fringe, “I really should go and prepare my next class…” he said off-handedly when some of the students scoffed at him.

Then he hurried off – and Ron finally turned face-to-face with Harry when he sneered, “Prepare his class. Gone curl his hair, more like.”

Harry had thought it, too, but he laughed as if he hadn’t, glad when Ron joined in. Side by side, they let the rest of the Gryffindors draw ahead of them, then they darted down a side passage and hurried off towards Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom. He could barely believe that they had made it without a hiccup when the hiccup came in the form of Professor McGonagall stomping down the hallway with her mouth in the thinnest of lines and her hair pulled painfully to the back of her skull, perfectly positioned underneath her hat.

She had changed robes. She now wore pristine emerald green ones, one exuding importance and sophistication.

Harry somehow doubted that she had chosen those only for the sake of her advanced students…

“Potter! Weasley! What are you doing?” She hissed at them, spiking such fear in the pit of Harry’s guts that he lowkey wished the heir would come out of the wall and kill him right there.

“We were – we were –” Ron stammered, hopelessly looking around himself. There was just a buttload of nothing in the corridor… “we were going to – to go and see –”

“Hermione!” Harry said, perhaps far too quickly. Far too loudly. But that had been the only plausible excuse that had come to mind. Even if he was playing fast and loose with the word plausible… “We haven’t seen her for ages, professor.” He went on hurriedly, treading on Ron’s foot and hoping that his professor wouldn’t know that they’d only once come to see Hermione since her petrification, “and we thought we’d sneak into the Hospital Wing, you know, and tell her that... that the Mandrakes are nearly ready and, er, not to worry.”

McGonagall stared down at him with her eyes narrowed and her lips crisping impossibly more. His stomach sank, then – she wasn’t buying it. But then she sighed and, Harry realised, his professor also couldn’t be bothered to occupy her time with punishing them.

And having them in the Hospital Wing seemed like a better option than having them roaming the castle on their own.

“Tell Madam Pomfrey I have given my permission.” McGonagall said simply, stirring her skirts out of the way so they could pass, which they did, running.

“Well done, Harry.” Ron mumbled as they turned a corner, “Now we’ve got no choice but to actually go to the bloody Hospital Wing.” Harry was the one to ignore his friend this time and, once they got to the French doors, he pushed them open before Ron could suggest something terrible.

Like Professor McGonagall, Madam Pomfrey couldn’t be bothered with their excuses. She couldn’t even be bothered by their presence as she skipped around the Hospital Wing, adjusting her hair and checking on the patients on overdrive.

He shared a glance with Ron. Then they shrugged, walking to Hermione’s empty bedside.

They shared another glance, then, and they both looked down. The other petrified had gifts and get-well cards spread around them, brought by friends. They were Hermione’s only friends. Or the only ones who could tolerate her, as Nott had lazily pointed out one too many times, and they had brought her nothing. When she woke up later tonight, she would see the others eating Chocolate Frogs and hugging pictures to their chests, and have nothing to do but watch.

“Wonder if she did see her attacker, though?” Ron questioned aloud as he fidgeted, finally looking up at Hermione’s stiff form with Harry. “Because if the heir sneaked up on all of them, no one’ll ever actually know…”

Harry shushed him when he noticed something in Hermione’s right hand, wondering if it had been there the first and only time he had been there to see her. It lay clenched on top of her blankets, and bending closer, he saw a piece of paper scrunched inside her fist. He made sure Madam Pomfrey was still making sure the other patients were presentable before pointing it out to Ron.

Getting it out was a lot easier than Harry had initially thought. He had sweat in place, dreading the death grip Hermione’s fingers suggested and fearing that the piece of parchment would rip. But it didn’t. It was like… like it had just been placed there. It fell onto the mattress at the barest touch of his fingertips.

“I think… this is from a library book – look, the Hogwarts crest is imprinted in the corner.” Harry cleared his throat when Ron smartly pointed out what he hadn’t noticed. What he hadn’t thought to notice. “Weird – Hermione would rip her own arm out before tearing a page of a book.”

Harry ignored that comment with a roll of his eyes and started reading, voice barely above a whisper.

Of the many fearsome beasts and monsters that roam our land, there is none more curious or more deadly than the Basilisk, known also as the King of Serpents. This snake, which may reach gigantic size, and live many hundreds of years, is born from a chicken’s egg, hatched beneath a toad. Its methods of killing are most wondrous, for aside from its deadly and venomous fangs, the Basilisk has a murderous stare, and all who are fixed with the beam of its eye shall suffer instant death. Spiders flee before the Basilisk, for it is their mortal enemy, and the Basilisk flees only from the crowing of the rooster, which is fatal to it.

“Merlin’s beard…” Ron gasped quietly next to him, ripping the paper from Harry’s fingers. “And look here what’s written.” He pointed out something else that Harry had overlooked. A neat, fancy handwriting had scribbled on the edges. Literally written all the answers so that the puzzle could fall into place.

How: pipes within walls.

Not dead: reflection = petrification.

Monster = snake / Heir = Parselmouth.

Everything, all the answers, were just there. Spelled out. Making so much sense that Harry couldn’t even begin to doubt them. He couldn’t even begin to doubt Hermione this time. She had done it – figured it all out. And she had written it all down for them to find and be able to solve this without her if the worst happened…

“She got the answer – to everything.” Harry whispered, squeezing that piece of paper in his palm, “The monster is a serpent, that’s why only I have been hearing its voice through the walls before each attack. Because I understand Parseltongue. And it all makes sense now – the heir was out to kill every Muggle Born, but no one has looked into the Basilisk’s eyes. Not really. Colin had his camera; Justin must have seen it through Nearly Headless Nick – and it’s not like a ghost could die again – and Hermione… she had the mirror with her. She and the Ravenclaw Prefect must have seen the monster through the mirror.”

“What about Mrs Norris?” Ron asked, his frown telling Harry that his friend was almost there, but still… he was bothered.

Harry let him have it when Ron ripped the parchment from him.

“Water.” Harry replied upon thinking back to that night – the first attack. “Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom flooded that night, remember? There was water everywhere. Mrs Norris must have seen the Basilisk’s reflex through the water. It all fits, Ron!” He insisted, wanting to hit the ginger in the head when Ron continued to examine that parchment as if it wouldn’t suddenly stop making this much sense. “Don’t be thick! Here – the Basilisk flees only from the crowing of the rooster, which is fatal to it!” He read aloud. “Before I found Nick and Justin – do you remember? Nott and Malfoy found a dead rooster! Hagrid thought they’d killed it, but it couldn’t have been them; the roosters started dying way before that, according to Hagrid himself! It was the heir, Ron! The heir didn’t want any roosters close to the castle once the Chamber was opened! And look – look! Spiders flee before the Basilisk! It all fits perfectly, Ron!”

“I know that, Harry! I know it all fits!” Ron snapped at him and, once Harry took a step back, his friend slacked. “It’s just… Hermione was convinced that Nott was the heir.”

“So?” Harry asked.

“So,” his friend rolled his eyes loudly, holding up the parchment as if Harry hadn’t been reading from it all this time, “how come what she found completely proves that Nott is innocent? He is not a Parselmouth, he didn’t kill the rooster, he wanted to investigate the spiders – why would he if they were already fleeing? This makes no sense, Harry.”

“Maybe…” Harry bit his lip. He hadn’t thought about that. It had never even crossed his mind. What was important, though, what Ron failed so miserably to see, was that none of that mattered. None of that cancelled out what Hermione had found; it didn’t make it any less true. “Maybe she just changed her mind when she started figuring it all out. It doesn’t matter, Ron! Can’t you see – we have all the answers. And I bet… – the bathroom. The Basilisk has been getting around in the pipes – I bet the entrance of the Chamber is in the bathroom. Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom!”

“Yeah, I worked that out, too, but…” Ron trailed off, “Does this even seem like Hermione’s handwriting to you? Hers is a lot messier…”

“What does it matter?” Harry asked impatiently, already halfway to the door, “We’ve got to go straight to McGonagall – she can clean Hagrid’s name. She will probably be in the staff room – it’s nearly break. Come on!”

Ron still seemed reluctant. He hesitated before putting that parchment in his pocket and, stealing one last glance at Hermione’s stiff form, he sighed. He mumbled something under his breath before shaking his head and coming, nodding at Harry before they left.

It took Harry a second to notice that Madam Pomfrey was nowhere in sight, but, much like Ron’s concerns, her absence was just secondary to what they had just discovered.

Together, they ran downstairs and went straight to the large staff room. It was his first time there, in the middle of that panelled room full of dark wooden chairs and banners of all the Houses adorning coloured glass windows with the Hogwarts crest. There were a few chairs lined up in the antechamber that Harry supposed were for the students who needed to speak to a professor, but neither he nor Ron could master the calm necessary to sit still.

They kept walking in circles by the door, not trusting themselves inside last Snape found them once the bell rang, and he slid his way inside. Though they hadn’t needed to worry – the bell never rang. The clock chimed the beginning of the break, but it was as if the castle had not been notified. Instead, it was Professor McGonagall’s voice that was magically amplified through the school…

“All students to return to their house dormitories at once. All teachers return to the staff room. Immediately, please.”

Before Harry could fully compute or make sense of what had just happened, Ron was pushing him inside an ugly sort of wardrobe to their left, where Professor Lockhart’s smelly cologne burned the hairs of their nostrils as they crammed inside with all the teachers’ cloaks.

“This way we can hear what they’re about to say.” Ron mumbled, and they watched through a small gap as the professors filtered into the room, most of them looking puzzled.

Harry counted fourteen pairs of legs and was lying his ear on the gap when the door banged open again. He had never seen those robes before – dozens of maroon robes and dragon-ride boots as they strode in. Then, bringing the very back, came two wizards whose superior step seemed oddly familiar. And one of them had a cane…

“Aurors.” Ron whispered, eyes blown wide. “Why are the Aurors here?”

“Aurors?” Harry asked.

“Wizard police, Harry.”

“It has happened.” Professor McGonagall spoke sombrely and, for once, Harry was glad he couldn’t see her face, “A student has been taken by the heir into the Chamber itself – where the monster, too, is.”

“Which student, Minerva?” Harry believed it was Professor Flitwick who had squeaked the question while others gasped. The Aurors, though – none of them let out a pip.

“Ginny Weasley.” Ron slid down silently down onto the wardrobe floor when McGonagall finally answered, and, looking at his friend, Harry tried to decide if the feeling of guilt in his gut was as misplaced as he was trying to convince himself it was. “Her family has already been notified, and they should be on their way. Meanwhile, I will need all of you to help the Aurors with the castle’s evacuation. Considering the danger the monster and the heir pose to all of us alike, the Auror Department has thought it best to only open the Chamber and venture inside once no student or teacher can become collateral in the case the operation goes south.”

“And do the Aurors know the location of the Chamber?” Snape asked the question that Harry, too, wanted to be answered, but before one of the maroon-dressed wizards could reply, the staff room door banged open again. At the many scoffs and moans, Harry was sure that it was not Dumbledore coming back to save them.

Lockhart walked in beaming, “So sorry – I seemed to have dozed off – what have I missed?”

“Figures.” Harry mumbled as that fool continued to go back and forth on his tiptoes, somehow unaware that the hatred for him rivalled that the teachers felt for the heir.

“Gilderoy, how compassionate of you to show up.” Harry frowned when McGonagall spoke next, her legs coming closer to Lockhart’s pale pink robes as if she hadn’t spent the year begrudgingly stopping Nott from putting their professor in a coma, “A girl has been snatched by the heir into the Chamber. While we deal with the evacuation of the school, why don’t you make yourself useful and brief the Aurors about the location of the Chamber?”

“I-I…” Gilderoy stammered, and Harry wanted to scream at the professors when Snape, too, stepped forward and fed into that nonsense.

“Indeed, Gilderoy.” He said silkily, “Weren’t you just telling us yesterday that you’ve known all along where the Chamber lies? Perhaps you should go to your office and prepare for the battle ahead – the Auror Department sure will need someone as… experienced… as yourself.”

“D-Did I? I don’t recall…”

“I certainly remember you saying you were sorry you hadn’t had a crack at the monster before Hagrid was arrested.” Harry thought that was Professor Vector speaking, but he couldn’t be sure. “Didn’t you say that the whole affair had been bungled, and that you should have been given free rein from the first?”

“We’ll leave it to you, then, Gilderoy.” McGonagall sealed the fate of the entire school before anyone – not even Lockhart – could protest. “You go… prepare while we get everyone out of your way. Once you think yourself ready, just… give the Aurors a call, will you? They will be at your disposal.”

Harry heard some snickering, but no one protested. Not even said Aurors as some of them crossed their arms over their chests – wands at the ready.

He saw the back of Lockhart’s head turning desperately around him, but all gathered there seemed to have some kind of suicidal, twisted confidence in his abilities. Non-existent abilities, Harry wanted to shout. He was almost barging in when Ron stopped him, his grip on Harry’s arm visceral. Then he noticed that his friend was pointing at something, barely visible through the gap.

That wizard’s cane… when he tilted it, they could see its handle. A snake’s head.

Lucius Malfoy.

What… what was going on there?

“V-Very well.” Lockhart finally stuttered, “I’ll – I’ll be in my office, getting – getting ready.”

No one stopped before he left the room.

“Right,” McGonagall spoke, acting as if she had not ruined any chance Ginny had of ever being rescued, “that’s got him out from under our feet. The Heads of Houses should go and inform the students what has happened. I have the Elves preparing the carriages to bring them to the Hogsmeade station – Rosmerda has readied the Hogwarts Express to bring the children home. The rest of the student body will do one last patrol of the school grounds in search of any stray students. Meanwhile, the Aurors –”

“We’ve traced a strategy and will secure the grounds against the monster.” One of the wizards easily interrupted McGonagall. Like hers, his tone brought no room for discussion. “Once the school is empty, we’ll go in.”

“Anything else?” McGonagall asked him, seemingly not mad at being interrupted.

“The two boys,” the Aurors said cryptically, “it shall be useful to speak to them before facing the heir.”

The last thing Harry saw was Lucius Malfoy switching the cane from one hand to the other before he, too, left the room. Ron didn’t speak a word as they walked back to their Common Room, already knowing that it was no use to try to outrun McGonagall. There was no avoiding trouble this time.

Again, Harry was at the receiving end of his friend’s silent treatment, and he wondered if a part of Ron also kind of blamed him for Ginny’s kidnapping. If a part of him, too, wished to go back in time and tell Harry to shut up when Ginny sat next to them, ready to speak. Tell Harry to mind his own business whenever he talked Ron out of bringing Ginny to the Hospital Wing or to that very same staff room whenever she started “acting weird”.

“There’s a chance she might still be alive, Ron.” He offered lamely. “She just… she just knew something she shouldn’t, that’s all. I mean, she’s a Pureblood – the heir doesn’t kill Purebloods.”

“So what – you think the Slytherin Heir has some sort of code of conduct?” Ron snapped at him. “And there is no chance, Harry – not with the Aurors depending on bloody Lockhart to find the Chamber!”

“I-I…” Harry stopped, hating what he was about to suggest, but fearing for his friendship. Fearing what would happen if he did nothing – what Nott and Malfoy would say. How much they would mock him. The one-wonder hero who let his best friend’s sister be killed despite knowing exactly how to stop it… “I think we should go and see Lockhart. Tell him what we know. He will take credit for it, but at least the Aurors will have an idea of where to start looking and what they are up against.”

Ron was already standing on the first step of the moving staircase when he halted. His nod was almost imperceptible as he agreed, turning around with his face set. And that determination… Harry had never seen Ron wearing determination like that before.

The sky was beginning to change colours as the sun moved behind the clouds as they walked down to Lockhart’s office. They exchanged a questioning glance, though, at the loud thumps, scraping and hurried footsteps they could hear coming from inside. Afraid of what he would find, Harry knocked – and the busy room felt suddenly and weirdly silent.

The door was opened the tiniest crack, and light blue eyes peered through, “Oh… Mr Potter… Mr Weasley…” their professor opened the door a bit wider after greeting them, though he did make sure there was no one else waiting for permission to enter before stepping aside, “I’m rather busy at the moment. If you would please be quick…”

“We have some… information for you, professor.” Harry said tentatively, his voice dying low in his throat when he noticed that the office previously filled with the laughter of Lockhart’s self-portraits was almost completely stripped. Two large trunks stood open on the floor. Robes, jade green, lilac, midnight blue, had been hastily folded into one of them; books were jumbled untidily into the other. Said photographs that had covered the walls were now crammed into boxes on the desk…

“Are you going somewhere?” Ron asked him, tone clipped.

“Er, well, yes,” Lockhart answered after a pause, ripping a life-size poster of himself from the back of the door as he spoke, and starting to roll it up, “Urgent call… unavoidable… got to go…”

“What about my sister?” Ron asked jerkily and, following suit, Harry also blocked the door when his friend did.

“Well, as to that – most unfortunate.” Lockhart babbled, avoiding their eyes and biting his lips as he wrenched open a drawer and started emptying the contents into a bag. “No one regrets more than I –”

“You’re the Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher!” Harry exploded, his frustration with that joke of a man erupting after a year of having had to deal with cheap, unasked-for advice, “You can’t go now! You have to at least tell the Aurors what you know, if you’re not gonna face the monster yourself!”

“Well, I must say… when I took the job…” his professor just muttered, now pilling socks on top of his robes, “nothing in the job description… didn’t expect…”

“You mean you’re just running away?” Harry asked disbelievingly, glaring at Ron when his friend scoffed at his incredulity at the obvious, “After all that stuff you did in your books?”

Lockhart stopped, “Books can be misleading.” He said delicately.

“You wrote them!” Ron shouted, face as red as his hair.

“My dear boy,” Lockhart said, straightening a bit… threateningly and frowning at them, “do use your common sense. My books wouldn’t have sold half as well if people didn’t think I’d done all those things. No one wants to read about some ugly Armenian warlock, even if he did save a village from werewolves. He’d look dreadful on the front cover. No dress sense at all. And the witch who banished the Bandon Banshee had a hairy chin. I mean, come on…”

“So you’ve just been taking credit for what a load of other people have done?” Ron sneered, and Harry could see the insults his friend wanted to hurl at that farse. Use all the language that would render him grounded until his hundredth birthday.

Harry was barely paying attention, though.

He knew Lockhart was a buffoon, but to hear all that narcissistic monologue come out of his mouth… as if appearance could define who had the right to achieve greatness. He wondered if perhaps… if perhaps he sounded like that when he spoke of the Gryffindors against the Slytherins. When he spoke of his parents against Nott’s.

Nott and Malfoy had never even pretended to respect Lockhart. They had never believed that he could do anything more than comb his own hair. They had known – or at least suspected. And they had done something about it. In a very slick, wicked, snake-like manner, they had done something about it. They had mocked Lockhart’s books and asked their professor if he had kept the references he used whenever the class had to write a new assignment about some fake adventure or other.

Each one of Nott’s pranks had dismantled a bit more of the illusion as they made it clear that Lockhart could not even best an eleven-year-old playing tricks on him.

The two Slytherins have known all along while Hermione berated every student who dared speculate if the books their professor wrote could actually be true. And he bet that McGonagall did, too. Nott was never punished when his target was Lockhart.

No, he was just half-heartedly reprimanded.

But if two Slytherins could so easily figure out his scheme, how come Dumbledore had hired a lying joke to be their teacher in the first place?

“It’s not nearly as simple as that.” Lockhart had the guts to snap impatiently at them, as if he had been somehow insulted. “There was work involved. I had to track these people down. Ask them exactly how they managed to do what they did. Then I had to put a Memory Charm on them so they wouldn’t remember doing it. If there’s one thing I pride myself on, it’s my Memory Charms. No, it’s been a lot of work, boys. It’s not all book signings and publicity photos, you know. You want fame, you have to be prepared for a long, hard slog.”

Lockhart took one step closer to them with each word he spoke. He bent to their height, and his shiny white teeth seemed threatening up close. Their perfection seemed wrong – much like the man now smiling widely at them as Harry and Ron took a step backwards.

“Let’s see,” he said cheerfully, “I think that’s everything. Yes, only one thing left.” Harry was already prepared when he pulled out his wand. At least this he had been able to see coming.

“Expelliarmus!” He screamed the same spell Snape had used to blast Lockhart away, the only spell he actually knew by heart, and his professor was sent flying backwards, falling over his trunk. Ron was ready to catch his wand when it flew high into the air, and he flung it out of the open window.

“What d’you want me to do?” Lockhart asked them weakly, pathetically holding his hands up in surrender when Harry never lowered his wand. “I don’t know where the Chamber of Secrets is! There’s nothing I can do!”

“You’re in luck.” Ron hissed, kicking their professor’s legs until Lockhart stood, “We think we know where it is and what’s inside it. We’re now going to check it and, if we are right, you can take all the credit you want and tell the Aurors how to save my sister.”

Harry didn’t understand when Lockhart started to laugh. He was laughing so hard that tears were coming to his eyes as, still mocking them, he let himself be marched out of his office and to where the messages shone in blood close to Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom.

“You’re so naïve, boys.” Lockhart said after gulping, stopping at the entrance, “Who do you think brought the Aurors here? McGonagall?” Harry only stared, and his professor laughed again. His assumption had been obvious, then. “She can’t. Deputy Headmistress is a meaningless title, so everyone thinks Dumbledore knows how to delegate. And the headmaster has barred the Aurors from the grounds since he assumed the post. It was no member of the faculty who brought them.”

“What has that got to do with anything?” Ron demanded impatiently. “What’s important is that the Aurors are here – my sister still has a chance.”

“Lucius Malfoy, Lorcan Nott and Ravenna Yaxley came with them, did you know?” Lockhart told them, his despair now clear as he once planted his feet on the floor before Ron could push him inside the bathroom. “The same people who got rid of Dumbledore. Do you truly think any of them is concerned with rescuing your sister, Weasley? You will only be doing what they want if you find the Chamber.”

“What do they want?” Harry asked while Ron sneered, “Does it matter?!”

“If I knew, Harry, I’d have left this castle before they had the chance to ambush me – ambush all of us like they did today.”

Lockhart was a scheme artist, a liar. A fraud. But Harry believed him now. And he hesitated – could they really trust the Aurors? The Ministry’s police, Ron had said. But wasn’t the Minister under the Death Eaters’ thumbs? Harry had seen it – Minister Fudge caving under Lucius Malfoy, terrified of the mere mention of the Notts.

And wasn’t the Ministry the very place where Lord Malfoy and Lord Nott worked? What was to say that they hadn’t orchestrated everything on behalf of their old cause? What was to say that, like Lockhart’s books, their animosity wasn’t just a front, and they were all in bed together to pull their final act against the Light Side?

“We don’t need the Aurors.” Harry said, his willingness now renewed. The willingness to throw that witch back into prison and prove once and for all that, even if Nott and Malfoy were not the heir, they were, indeed, working together. Under their parents’ orders no less. Who knows – maybe he was wrong and Nott and Malfoy did kill those roosters to make way for the Basilisk. Maybe they weren’t just investigating the spiders, but making sure they were truly fleeing and their sick plan was working out. “We know everything there is to know, and we will rescue Ginny ourselves.”

Ron trembled slightly, but that new determination was still shining in his eyes when he finally nodded and, not waiting for Lockhart to attempt to stall them again, he pushed their professor into the flooded bathroom haunted by the ghost of the heir’s first victim.

Moaning Myrtle was sitting on the cistern of the end toilet, “Oh, it’s you,” she said when she saw Harry, her expression bluntly betraying her disappointment at seeing him there, “What do you want this time?”

Harry didn’t have it in him to try to charm her. He wouldn’t even know where to start. So he stayed put at a distance and spoke simply, “To ask how you died.”

Myrtle’s whole aspect changed at once. She looked as though she had never been asked such a flattering question, and, next to him, Ron grimaced.

“Ooooh, it was dreadful!” She told them with relish. “It happened right in here. I died in this very cubicle. I remember it so well. I’d hidden because Olive Hornby was teasing me about my glasses. The door was locked, and I was crying, and then I heard somebody come in. They said something funny – a different language, I think it must have been. Anyway, what really got me was that it was a boy speaking. So, I unlocked the door, to tell him to go and use his own toilet, and then –” Myrtle swelled importantly, her face shining in shades of grey, “I died.”

“How?” Ron asked impatiently, rolling his eyes at the not-so-cheerful tale told cheerfully.

“No idea.” Myrtle told them in hushed tones as if it were a secret. “My friends Draco and Theo know, but they didn’t tell me. Such good friends – they didn’t want to upset me more. I just remember seeing a pair of great big yellow eyes, then my whole body sort of seized up. Then I was floating away…” She looked dreamily at nothing, “And then I came back again. I was determined to haunt Olive Hornby, you see. Oh, she was sorry she’d ever laughed at my glasses. Theo says it was pettily awesome of me – he says I have his respect now, he does.”

Harry rolled his eyes at Nott’s existence, “Where exactly did you see those eyes, Myrtle?” He asked her gently.

“Somewhere there,” she said, pointing vaguely to the sink. “Close to that tap that’s never worked.”

He and Ron left Lockhart shaking in place as they dashed to the only tap that was still new, visibly unused. They gasped simultaneously once it became clearer, the closer to it they came: scratched on the copper side of that tap was a tiny snake contorting in on itself. So simple it was almost invisible, but it was there. The mark of Salazar Slytherin.

“Harry,” Ron said, bumping shoulders with him, “say something. Something in Parseltongue.”

It took him a few embarrassing tries. When the candlelight hit it just at the right angle, he was able to envision it moving, then it was easy to think of that embroidery as being alive. The next time he commanded it to open, then, it was that slick, dry hissing that escaped through his lips. It took barely a second for the tap to glow with a brilliant white light before it began to spin.

It was as if that spinning had snapped a lock into place, all the engines fitting together perfectly so that the sink could start to move – until it suddenly sank out of sight, exposing a large pipe wide enough for ten men to slide into. So, it would also easily fit a gigantic monster such as the Basilisk…

“So,” Ron started as they stared into the dark depths of the pipe, seeing no bottom. Though they both knew what they were about to do. What they must do now that they found out they can’t trust the professor tasked with protecting them or the Aurors entrusted with the safety of their world, “we’re going down there.”

“We’re going down there.” Harry agreed, preparing himself to jump when Ron’s hand on his shoulder stopped him.

“Let him jump first.” Ron said, pushing their cowardly professor forward, “If he dies, we don’t jump. And if the Basilisk is down there… maybe it won’t bother with us if it’s already had a meal.”

The idea sounded a tad… sadistic, but so did the prospect of literally jumping to their deaths. So, Harry nodded his head and watched as his best friend pushed Gilderoy Lockhart down the dark pipe…

**

Fawkes didn’t seem to have broken a single drop of sweat when he dropped them with a void thud on the marble of Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom. Harry regretted the now short length of the pipe once his feet touched the ground and the sensation of pure lightness left him feeling heavier than he remembered.

Being carried by Fawkes was different from flying a broom. Maybe it was the weightlessness he had never before experienced. Or maybe it was the tranquillity of completely giving up control and just trusting for once. Trusting that his feet would once more touch solid ground and that his heart would continue beating regardless.

He now missed the peace of having Fawkes’ wings batting above him, splashing a gush of warm, delicate wind on his face every few seconds. He missed the freedom of letting his mind wander without having to set a direction.

He couldn’t tell anymore if his behaviour was a personality trait, perhaps inherited from a father he had never met, or if it was some kind of conditioning he had imposed upon himself upon entering the Wizarding World and hearing from a hundred mouths that he could do no wrong. That the world depended on him. That only he could save it…

Harry had almost died. He could have died down there. He would have died – had Fawkes not shown up to leave the Basilisk vulnerable, if Tom Riddle wasn’t just a sixteen-year-old memory of a bratty teenager who liked the sound of his voice almost as much as Lockhart liked his hair.

The heaviness of planting his legs on the ground and making his arms into dead weights along his sides increased tenfold when Ron yelped next to him, and Harry finally noticed what had spooked Fawkes into fleeing the moment the bathroom tiles came into focus.

For once, no wails were coming from Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom. The ghost was silent, and the only sound was snickering – coming from behind the thick wall of maroon-dressed wizards pointing their wands directly at the trio standing weakly in front of the entrance of the Chamber of Secrets.

“Mr Potter,” Harry froze when Snape’s dark robes dragged water closer to where he stood, and small waves hit the dirty hem of Harry’s pants. His professor was like a spider inching closer, and his presence a web that closed more and more tightly around Harry’s throat. He gulped, then, when bottomless onyx eyes landed on the silver sword by his side, covered in blood and the tears of a phoenix, “care to explain why you’ve inserted yourself in an Auror operation?”

“T-The Aurors…” he exchanged a glance with his best friend – and they noticed the same. All their professors were there, staring incredulously at them. Side by side with the Auror Department – trusting them fully. Not Lockhart and not even Dumbledore, but the Aurors who were now pushing Harry and Ron out of the way to examine that pipe and casting spells on the gaping sink, “w-we thought… we – who brought the Aurors to Hogwarts? Professor Lockhart said –”

“Gilderoy Lockhart is a fool who barely knows how to shake a bloody wand.” Harry bumped into an Auror who, unceremoniously, snapped the tab where Slytherin’s crest was carved and conjured a glass box to store it in. A glass box that emanated pure magic and vanished into thin air before he could attempt to make any sense of it. Never before had McGonagall spoken so curtly with him. Never so strictly. A hundred detentions under her, hundreds of incomplete assignments and failed attempts at a spell he had not memorised… he had made her mad before. Even disappointed. Never this, though. As if she wished he wasn’t there at all for her to deal with. “The professors and I had finally managed to get rid of him before he could think to ruin the efforts to defeat the Heir of Slytherin. Imagine our surprise when Moaning Myrtle alerted Theo and Mr Malfoy of their professor’s new adventure in the Chamber of Secrets of all places.”

Ron glared at the ghost floating silently in the back of the room, above the two friends she had betrayed Harry to. Smirking at him with their arms crossed were the two Slytherins, guarded by none other than Lorcan Nott, whose hands were possessively resting on the boys’ shoulders.

A protector, he was. Had been all along, Harry supposed.

“I like them better.” Moaning Myrtle offered as a lame explanation for her betrayal, shrugging as she, too, took refuge in the imposing shadow of Lord Nott’s height.

And there, almost hidden behind the sea of maroon, was Headmaster Dumbledore. Only his eyes weren’t twinkling. His lips weren’t smiling warmly. And his robes weren’t bright. No, their Headmaster was dressed in the most sombre robe Harry had ever seen him wearing and, perched on his shoulder, was Fawkes. A mighty bird who had, mere minutes ag,o blinded a basilisk and rescued three lives – and who was looking at the floor as if conscious enough to know he should feel ashamed.

“That on the boy’s hand –” one of the Aurors barked after a team of seven fearlessly jumped down the pipe, “is it what I think it is?”

Harry tried to swiftly hide his hand behind him, but he might as well have blasted a wall in the tentatively silent room. A moment later, the hat and the sword were ripped from him by yet another Auror. And these, too, vanished out of thin air – two more pieces for the investigation Dumbledore had tried to prevent, and the Slytherins forced onto Hogwarts.

“How curious.” Another Auror commented, “I do wonder, though, how the Sorting Hat and Godric Gryffindor’s sword ended up in the hands of a twelve-year-old. Brought by the phoenix, am I correct to assume?”

Before Harry could make up a lie, Nott laughed, “Dumbledore thinks he is so sneaky.” He drawled, shrugging off his father’s grip on him and McGonagall’s warning glance when he turned back to the Headmaster. “You knew it all along, didn’t you? Why else would you keep Hagrid in the castle after he was expelled for murder?”

The tapping of that cane was like a claw ripping the flesh from Harry’s bones one inch at a time. The way it scraped the marble and splashed the water with the same royalty that Lucius Malfoy walked, as if even the simplest of things were expected to slow down and bow to his presence.

What ignited Harry’s panic, however, was that they did. The very air in that bathroom seemed to tremble when Lucius Malfoy tapped that cane a second time, and he came into the light, ignoring his son while he tilted his head at Dumbledore. And, Harry exchanged a worried glance with Ron, gone was the calculated calm and the reassuring aura their Headmaster had displayed in Hagrid’s cabin that day. In its place was only dread.

“Things are not looking well, are they?” Lord Malfoy asked in a whisper. He ticked his tongue. “What will the parents think if news of this gets out? Once more, the Hogwarts Headmaster has knowingly endangered their children to, what – test? – the boy you told the world is a hero, Dumbledore? I imagine what the Board shall do once they hear that you knew exactly where to send your phoenix to rescue Mr. Potter, that you knew exactly the kind of weapon it had to deliver so that a basilisk could be killed. Unless you wish to tell the Auror Department this has all been a dreadful coincidence?”

Harry sucked in a breath. Could it really…? No, it couldn’t. But Dumbledore didn’t meet his gaze when Harry turned alarmed eyes to him…

“I shall happily face any case you build against me, Lord Malfoy.” Dumbledore said. “Though I’d advise you to wait until the Aurors finish their investigation. I am sure you will find that Miss Weasley will provide some incontestable evidence that will surely exclude me as the main perpetrator, wouldn’t you agree?”

Harry frowned as the two wizards stared at each other. Then his frown deepened when the Aurors demanded they both step away from the crime scene and surrender their wands to the Ministry voluntarily on that day – or involuntarily tomorrow. Neither of them seemed afraid, though. Both somehow convinced they would continue untouchable, if only because, if they pointed the finger at each other, then none of them would be convicted.

This was how it worked, right? At least, Harry thought so. In a way, he doubted anything would stick. One would have to be mad to arrest Albus Dumbledore. And even madder to attempt to incarcerate Lord Malfoy…

Harry supposed Lorcan Nott might have reached the same conclusion as he cleared his throat, “Theo, Draco, your help here is no longer needed. Why don’t the two of you go to your Common Room? I’ll pass by before going home.” When Nott made to speak, his father only shook his head, “Not a request, Theo. Go.”

Harry made to follow them, wanting to be anywhere else but there, but McGonagall stopped him sternly, “Not the three of you, Mr. Potter.” He stayed put, then, with his head down and eyes stinging.

“I shall see you in a moment, Lorcan.” Lord Malfoy said lowly, cane now secured horizontally in his grip, when that fearless Auror once more told him to leave the crime scene. “Oh, and, Dumbledore, don’t think for a second a fancy choice of words will keep you in this castle. Your days here are numbered.”

Harry gulped when Dumbledore just smiled, and he felt his chest lighten upon noticing that Ron seemed just as confused as he was. At least he wasn’t the only one who had no idea what was even going on there. And he was glad when the two wizards left – it was like he could breathe evenly again. For a beat, that was. The next second, McGonagall scowled and her cripped lips were turned directly at him.

“We shan’t intrude on the Aurors’ investigation any longer. Come, you three,” she said sternly, not an ounce of warmth in her tone, “the Weasleys are waiting in my office.”

“What about…?” Ron asked sheepishly, pointing vaguely to where Lockhart was waving at his own reflection.

“We will bring him to St. Mungus.” One of the Aurors replied with a grimace. “And keep this shit out of the press. Imagine the uproar when his fucking fans find out that he is a con artist now that he’s gone and made himself mad.”

The Aurors snickered as they guided Lockhart to a corner, and Harry looked at that with his chin hanging dumbly open.

Everyone had known all along.

The silence was deafening as they followed behind their professor’s fancy skirts and Lord Nott’s long strides around the empty hallways. Never before had Hogwarts been so quiet. Even at night, when Harry wasn’t supposed to be wandering about, he could always count on the wind to spook him, owls to startle or the occasional portrait to tease him. Now, though, not even Peeves was brave – or perhaps dumb – enough to be out. To make himself noticeable to the Aurors or the monster they were there to catch.

Harry saw his reflection on a suit or armour when they made a sharp turn, and his breath caught in his throat at what he saw. He barely recognised the void green gaze looking flashily back at him – consumed by fear still. Barely recognised the hunched back, the limp and the blood-drenched robes as his own.

Barely recognisable, he was.

And barely recognisable as a hero.

A glance was what it took to correctly assume that Harry and Ron had been lucky at best. A mere glance was what it took to disclose what their mouths would perhaps never utter: they weren’t good enough to be in the Chamber. Hadn’t it been for Fawkes, they would be two more corpses on Voldemort’s long list of murders. And what is worse, though, they would have been killed by a barely corporeal spirit not that much older than themselves.

And did Harry really have an excuse this time?

It was easy to rationalise why Nott was so much better, so much smarter than him. Easy to convince himself that it had nothing to do with him. Easy to repeat it how many times it took his mind to be fooled that Nott and Malfoy had had access to magic since they were babies. That they have been educated in magic since they were toddlers. That they got their first broom when they were a lot younger than Harry’s eleven years of age.

But with Tom Riddle…

Yes, he had four years more of Hogwarts education on his pocket, but Harry wondered if he would ever improve enough to be able to imprison his memory in a diary at 16. If he would ever understand magical theory enough to invent spells. Damn, if he would ever even be smart enough to successfully cover up a murder and place the blame so convincingly on someone else.

And Tom Riddle, if the memory he watched was to be believed, had had even less than Harry himself. He had grown up in an orphanage, not even aware that he had had parents who had loved him like Harry. And devoid of a famous legacy to buy him admiration, respect and the blind worship supposed to compensate for a shitty childhood and his orphanhood.

Had Harry been Tom – had he been Voldemort – would he have conquered the respect of countless professors by sheer magical achievement alone?

Looking at the angry thuds of McGonagall’s step and the violence of her movements when she opened the door to her office, Harry somehow doubted that. Not even his fooling of death once more was enough to earn him a rare, if exasperated, smile.

For a moment, there was silence as Harry, Ron, and Ginny stood in the doorway, covered in muck and slime and blood. Then there was a skull-splitting scream over the annoyingly loud chirping of one of the caged birds.

“Ginny!” Mrs. Weasley screeched as she leapt forward, pushing Lord Nott not-so-gently out of her way as she enveloped her pale daughter in her arms. Then Ginny broke down, tears leaking from her eyes and her body going limp in her mother’s embrace.

And, when the tiny girl started apologising, they couldn’t even start to pretend that she was innocent anymore. Still, though, Mrs. Weasley tried.

She pointed a chubby, trembling finger at Ravenna Nott where she stood next to the loony raven throwing itself against the bars of its cage. “YOU!” Mrs. Weasley roared, and Harry gulped again when Lady Nott just arched a perfectly styled eyebrow from beside her husband. Lord Nott also seemed unaffected as he calmly bent down and picked up his daughter in his arms, shushing her gently as she asked him about the bird. “Your son is behind this, I know! Had it not been for Harry, my daughter would be dead! I’ll have Dumbledore throw that delinquent – and you! – in Azkaban for what you’ve had him do!”

Everything happened just so fast after that…

In a flash, Lady Nott took her husband’s wand from its holster and, not a second later, a bright blue light was flying across the room. Harry shivered when it did. Not exactly because he was scared, but because the temperature dropped to a colder degree than the Scottish winter. Ice formed on the glass windows framing McGonagall’s office, and ice seemed to have cut Mrs. Weasley’s cheek where the spell had hit her.

A gash on the side of her face, it was. Though there was no blood, no gore. Just an empty role displaying a roll of teeth and scorch marks of frost around the wound. Ginny threw up at the ugly sight of her mother’s face without skin, and Harry could only stare, disgusted, as not even Mr. Weasley dared move a muscle.

Lorcan Nott hid his daughter’s face on his chest, then, not letting her see the damage her mother had caused. Not letting her see the complete lack of remorse in a face that slightly resembled her own. Then he took his wand back without a word, not defending the woman he married when McGonagall screamed her name.

Not Lady Nott. Not even Yaxley, as she was called by Lord Malfoy.

But Ravenna. And what she said…

“Ravenna,” she called again, “calm down.” Professor McGonagall said. Almost… gently. “Breathe – in and out. Just breathe.”

The raven in the cage was desperately battling the iron keeping him inside. Wings flapping incessantly and song ringing deafeningly in their ears. Echoes of pure desperation as it tried… as it tried to fly to Lady Nott. And she never spared that raven a glance, though Harry saw her flinching. Saw her faltering. And he knew that she really, really wanted to.

“Don’t you dare,” Lady Nott spoke gutturally, adjusting her skirt as if she wasn’t threatening that witch she had just disfigured, “say a word about my son.” It was as if Mrs. Weasley was scared to speak – like everyone else. Or maybe she was in pain. Or maybe cold – the temperature just kept dropping, even Harry’s toes were starting to freeze inside his shoes. “I tolerate your useless existence, Weasley, but I can just as easily stop being this reasonable. If you say one bad word about my boy, if you dare insinuate anything about him, I will freeze you until you’re solid, and then I’ll break you into a million pieces. No threat of Azkaban will stop me this time.”

“Azkaban is where you should be, you good-for-nothing, whoring –”

“That’s quite enough.” Professor McGonagall stopped Mrs. Weasley slurred insults. A wave of her wand fixed the damage Lady Nott had caused. Harry didn’t think anything of it, but he supposed he should have when Mr. Weasley narrowed his eyes. Then the ginger wizard motioned both his wife and children closer – away from McGonagall. “I mustn’t remind you, Molly, that not only are your children present, so is Zelda – who is a toddler. Let’s keep this moment civic. Understood?”

McGonagall’s commanding presence and authority apparently didn’t fade once one finished Hogwarts. Every grown wizard there nodded obediently, chastised. And the only one who dared go against the professor’s command was her own bird, which had yet to cease thrashing.

It was bleeding now, though still weirdly undeterred. Harry was about to ask if it was some kind of advanced enchantment, maybe not a real bird at all, when Lady Nott let such a… juvenile groan that Harry almost mistook her for a normal human for a second there.

“Bloody bird – stop testing my patience!” She hissed, finally turning to the raven. And it stopped the moment she spoke to it, as if compelled by her voice. As if drawn to it – drawn to her. As if it were hers. Her pet, her property, her enchantment – and her protector. Then she turned to McGonagall as if the moments before had never happened, “You should have gotten yourself rid of this prank ages ago.”

“Would you have?” Professor McGonagall replied cryptically before turning to the Weasley couple. With a nod, she acknowledged Ginny’s tears. And with a crisp of her lips, she announced her disappointment. Harry looked down again, suddenly fascinated by his laces. “Ginevra opened the Chamber, Molly. Theo – and Draco Malfoy – had nothing to do with it, or with her current… state.”

“This… this surely must be some mistake, Professor McGonagall.” Mr. Weasley started, though his resolve faltered when Ron looked away and Ginny wailed into her sleeve, neither of his children even tried to deny it. Harry didn’t – and that was enough to shock Mrs. Weasley into silence as she let go of her daughter to cover her gasp. “Ginny would never… she – how?”

“The evidence we’ve uncovered suggests possession, Arthur.” McGonagall said, her tone betraying nothing. Not even relief. Not even a slight undertone of pride that her students had uncovered. And then Harry realised – they never told her about Tom Riddle.

With all the frenzy of coming out of the Chamber, seeing Nott and Malfoy among the Aurors and witnessing Dumbledore being cornered by Lord Malfoy, Harry never realised that he had never said a thing. Offered no explanation. Disclosed any of his suspicions.

Though they knew. They had known. And Harry and Ron truly did get in the way of an Auror Operation from the moment they lied to McGonagall and went to the Infirmary instead of following the instructions they were given.

“An old diary of You-Know-Who somehow found its way to Ginevra, and her willingness to communicate with the memory stored within its pages allowed the possession to take place.” McGonagall explained what Tom Riddle had told Harry inside the Chamber. As Ginny trembled, he felt pity for her. Though he still wondered… how stupid must you be? “You-Know-Who intended to return. Luckily, his attempt failed.”

“Because of Harry?” Mrs. Weasley smiled encouragingly at him, but Harry looked down when Professor McGonagall shook her head.

“Despite the actions of Mr. Potter and Mr. Weasley, Molly.” She corrected, tone clipped.

“Where was Albus in all of this?” Mr. Weasley demanded, and, red in the face, he turned accusing eyes to Ron. “And where were you and your brothers while your sister was being possessed? How come none of you noticed a thing? You were supposed to look after her! Protected her in this castle filled with Snakes!”

“We tried!” Ron protested, mouth hanging open as both his mother and father turned on him. His blue eyes looked helplessly around, pleading even to the Notts when Harry averted his gaze. He supposed he should have said something, defended Ron perhaps, but… but Mrs. Weasley wasn’t mad at him. She was still… still proud of him. And Harry couldn’t risk losing that – he just couldn’t. “We tried to bloody tell you a bunch of times!”

“Language, Ronald Weasley!” Mrs. Weasleys roared, and Ron threw his hands in the air hopelessly.

“We wrote home, mom.” He insisted. “Percy, Fred, George and I – we wrote home and we… we told you at Christmas that Ginny was acting weird. That she looked sick, and she had no friends! We told you that we were scared and that… that we wanted you to pull us out of Hogwarts like everyone else’s parents were doing!”

Harry startled at that. He looked at his best friend, not bothering to hide the betrayal he was feeling. Ron never told him that – that he was planning on just leaving Hogwarts. Abandoning the school like all the others, and not remembering to invite Harry to come with him. Abandoning Harry.

Ron never acknowledged his hurt just like before Harry hadn’t acknowledged his plea.

He supposed he did deserve that in a way.

“And you told us to stop worrying, to leave Ginny be – that she was just skittish because of the likes of Malfoy and Nott, and because she has this bloody crush on Harry!” Ron continued. “You told us that nothing could happen while Dumbledore was at Hogwarts – and you did nothing when we told you that he wasn’t here anymore!”

“You people are unbelievable.” Harry startled when Lord Nott said that, his voice, so calm, so serene, now reverberating with something akin to disgust. Not disdain like Lord Malfoy’s, or mockery like his wife’s, but… disgust. And, at the sight of him hugging his daughter close, Harry supposed he could understand why.

Mr. Weasley just cleared his throat, fidgeting from one foot to another as he took off his glasses and scratched the bald patch of skin on top of his pointy head, “We… we wrote Albus, Ron.” He revealed, and both Harry’s and Professor McGonagall’s heads snapped to him. “We wrote him, and we were assured that… that You-Know-Who is in hiding in Albania. We were sure we had nothing to worry about – especially with you boys and Ginny being Purebloods.”

“Look who is hiding behind blood purity now.” Lady Nott drawled much like Harry imagined her son would have.

“So… you’ve known You-Know-Who is alive? All this time?” Ron asked his parents, shrugging off the hand his father had on his shoulder when he nodded his head heavily. “Did you know too?” He asked their professor.

“This information was only brought to my attention last year, Mr. Weasley, when I discovered that You-Know-Who was being lured into this castle.” She admitted through gritted teeth and sent Harry’s head spinning.

How come she didn’t know?

He had always assumed that McGonagall was Headmaster Dumbledore’s right-hand witch. His second in command. An ally. Yet he had trusted Ron’s parents over her. He had hidden crucial information from her. And now Harry wondered why. And he also wondered if this was the reason why McGonagall never moved a muscle once Dumbledore was suspended.

Looking at her now, the way she had so bluntly told Ron the truth, so caringly allowed him to step closer to her, take refuge in her shadow, he didn’t think she had done all this for the power. For the temporary title of Hogwarts Headmistress. Maybe… maybe she had done it to protect them.

Lockhart did say that Dumbledore never allowed the Ministry to interfere at Hogwarts. Yet there were the Aurors as soon as he was made to step aside – coming up with an operation to take place at the school, knowing about everything that was going on in the castle. And that, Harry realised, had been McGonagall all along after she saw that the danger was real…

“You knew who Tom Riddle was.” Harry didn’t ask; he stated.

“Indeed, I did.” McGonagall said simply. “I taught him, Mr. Potter, and I have always been well-aware of what Tom is capable of. He was – and still is – brilliant. Brilliant enough to preserve part of himself in a diary at the age of 16. And apparently, he is still charming enough to… convince… others of his word.”

“Surely Albus didn’t know.” Mrs. Weasley said. “If he said You-Know-Who was in Albania, that’s what he believed to be true.” She insisted, nodding her head so violently that it was as if she was trying to convince herself. “And you, Minerva, should be ashamed of just standing by when such a great wizard, one who has been nothing but kind to you, was taken from this castle by a Malfoy’s schemes.”

“The Board of Governors made the decision, Molly, not only Lord Malfoy.” McGonagall said simply, unbothered. “My hands were tied. As they were when your daughter never disclosed to anyone that a diary was speaking back to her and driving her to kill every roaster in this school.”

Ginny wailed again, seeking her father’s arms as she continued to apologise over and over again, “Tom was k-kind – in t-the b-beginning, d-dad. A-and I c-couldn’t r-remember what I-I d-did…”

“Oh, Ginny,” Mr. Weasley breathed out, “haven’t we taught you anything, sweety? Never trust anything that can think for itself if you can’t see where it keeps its brain. Why didn’t you show the diary to me or to your mother? A suspicious object like that, it was clearly full of Dark Magic!”

“I didn’t know!” Ginny sobbed, “I found it inside one of the books mom got me. I t-thought maybe Bill or Charlie had just left it there and forgotten about it…”

When the silence stretched, Lorcan Nott huffed, “This is all you have to say, Weasley? That your daughter shouldn’t trust talking diaries?” He threw his hands in the air, and Harry looked at that man, someone he had never really thought that much about, and started pacing. He sucked in his breath when Lord Nott approached Ginny and touched her forehead with the back of his hand before Mr. Weasley wrestled her away. “This girl is burning up – she still shows clear signs of possession. She needs a hospital before the consequences are lasting, Weasley.”

“L-lasting consequences?” Ron sputtered. “What… what will happen to her, Professor McGonagall?”

“Nothing.” Lady Nott drawled – and Harry felt a shiver go up his spine at her smirk. “Unless you consider sharing a tipping roof with a murderous little viper a problem.” She ignored her husband’s warning with a wave of her hand. “Revenge is, indeed, sweet, Weasley. Let’s see how high you will feel when the talk spreads that it wasn’t any of the Slytherins attempting to murder Mudbloods, but a Lion. I’ll be sure to be the first parent suing you for endangering a bunch of kids due to parental neglect. All because you couldn’t stop worshipping the mighty Albus Dumbledore.” The stretch of her lips was like a knife, the flash of her teeth like the taunt of a predator hunting prey at night. “I hope being on his good side is worth more than a daughter to you.”

“Enough, Ravenna.” Lord Nott hissed when Ginny fell to her knees, rocking herself back and forth as she panicked, and Ron stared at her hopelessly, his expression breaking. “She is a child, for Merlin’s sake.”

Lady Nott ignored his words as she looked back at the caged raven. And she wiggled her hand through the bars, inhaling heavily once it nestled against her palm. Her husband stared hard at that – and then it was like he had given up. Like he just didn’t care. With a wave of his hand, the cage burst open, and he didn’t spare that raven a glance once it flew to his wife without a second’s hesitation.

It landed on every available patch of skin on her body, rubbing its head on her face and trying to do so on her exposed cleavage. She slapped it away, though, mumbling, “Still a bloody perv, Bird.” Then she sighed, “If you mess my hair, my drawings or my clothes, I will snap your neck like I should have done when you were created with that love potion.”

Lord Nott sighed and turned to McGonagall, “Does Hagrid still care for the community of fairies on that island closest to the shore of the lake?” Harry’s professor just nodded, her gaze as confused as Harry was feeling by the sudden change of subject. “Very well – I’ll take Zelda to meet them until Law Enforcement finishes their business here. I will walk by the infirmary – would you like to accompany your sister there with me, Mr. Weasley?”

“She doesn’t need anything, Nott!” Mrs. Weasley roared. “Albus will fix her right up once he is back. He…” she trailed off once she realised that Lord Nott was not looking at her.

It took a whole second for Ron to realise that Lord Nott was, indeed, talking to him. Harry called his friend, but when Ron looked at him, Harry didn’t know what he had wanted to say. Don’t trust Nott? Could he really say that when Lorcan Nott was the only one there who seemed to be minimally concerned about Ginny’s well-being? So, he stayed silent, and Lord Nott didn’t seem insulted when Ron took his time eyeing him suspiciously before nodding his head in acceptance.

“Very well, then.” Lord Nott said simply, giving the Weasley couple a chance to take his place. But Mr. and Mrs. Weasley were still too busy glaring at Lady Nott. Still too busy being convinced that nothing bad would or could happen at Hogwarts under Dumbledore’s watch. “I’ll have Madam Pomphrey sending word if the girl needs to be transferred to the hospital.” He said to McGonagall, and then to Ron’s hollow stare, “And I’ll instruct her to send me the bill if that’s the case, boy, don’t worry.”

“Why?” Ron asked, voice cracking.

Lord Nott shrugged, “Because your sister is the victim here and the best treatment is what I would have wanted for my own daughter had it been Zelda thrown in this unfortunate situation.”

“We don’t need your charity, Nott!” Mr. Weasley started to scream, but Lord Nott had already left the room. Only his wife remained, looking incredulous at the spot where he had just disappeared from, “He never had any spine.” She mumbled.

“Yes, he has.” McGonagall said sternly, then she turned to Mr. and Mrs. Weasley, “If you insist on refusing Lord Nott’s offer, know that the Hogwarts infirmary shall always be available if Ginevra does need it.” She sighed, “Ravenna might have exaggerated it, but the effects of possession are no joke, Molly, and Albus is currently too worried with his struggle with Lucius Malfoy to pay attention to much else.” When the Weasleys didn’t acknowledge her, she shook her head, as if she had been expecting that, too. “I advise you to at least join Ginevra and Ronald. They are terrified, Molly – don’t let them be alone.”

Reluctantly, still glaring at Lady Nott from the corner of their eyes, the Weasleys went. Harry gulped upon noticing who else remained there, but then Lady Nott stalked out without a word to any of them. Harry just watched his professor while McGonagall watched her go.

“Let’s see where she goes.” McGonagall whispered quietly, clearly to herself before she turned to Harry, “Do you have anything to say for yourself and on behalf of Mr. Weasley before I start issuing punishments. Mr. Potter?”

“I-I… punishments, professor?” Harry stuttered. “B-But, but we… Ron, Hermione and I, we… we broke school rules a few times, but we discovered the Chamber! Ron and I only went there because Ginny was taken, and we thought you sent Lockhart there to rescue her! If we had known the Aurors were coming, we wouldn’t have –”

“And why should you have been informed, Mr. Potter?” McGonagall cut him off, her tone apparently genuinely curious as she walked behind him and took a seat behind her desk, massaging her temples exhaustedly, “Had you and Mr. Weasley done nothing, the Auror operation would have gone smoothly, and Miss Weasley would now be resting in the Ministry’s infirmary after being rescued.”

“B-But… but Lockhart…”

“Was a last resort hire because there were no other candidates.” She interrupted him once more. “The educators of this school are not the fools you take us for, Mr. Potter. We have known the truth about Gilderoy from the beginning, and we have consistently intervened in his lessons, so our students are not jeopardised by his lack of competency. Before anything, Mr. Potter, Hogwarts is a school, and our primary concern is the education of our students – not which of them is the most successful in forbidden extracurricular activities.”

“But last year…”

“Last year, Headmaster Dumbledore rewarded your recklessness – he even encouraged it for reasons that are solely his own.” Once more, she shut Harry up. “This year, he is still officially suspended, and I am acting Headmistress for the time being. I won’t make the same mistake as him and allow you to think that your behaviour is condoned, Mr. Potter.”

Harry crisped his lips this time, hands balling into fists. When he looked at her, he knew he would be in trouble even before the words came spiralling out of his mouth.

“Would I be punished if I were Theo instead?”

Professor McGonagall leaned forward on the table and, for a second there, Harry wished she had screamed at him. He wished she had raged at his insolence, been as loud as Mrs. Weasley’s howler. He wished she had been as dishevelled as Nott could make her when one of his pranks went wrong…

But his professor just leaned forward on her elbows and locked her gaze on his, binding him in place more powerfully than any spell.

“Theo is punished for every single instance he goes out of line, Mr. Potter. Of all the students in this castle, you are the only one who has ever gotten special treatment – including from me. Or would you like me to take back your broom and your position in my Quidditch team?” Harry swallowed with difficulty, not trusting himself to answer her question. “As it is, Theo and Mr. Malfoy were awarded fifty points each, much like you, Mr. Weasley and Miss Granger were last year, for services to the school. Is that fair enough for you, Mr. Potter?”

“I don’t understand, professor.” Harry admitted quietly.

“You see, Mr. Potter,” she continued, “Theo and Mr. Malfoy figured out what the monster was. Unfortunately, they were reluctant to do anything about it because Lucius Malfoy has been using this mayhem as an opportunity to suspend Headmaster Dumbledore, as you well know by now. So, they wrote that information on a ripped piece of paper and hid it with Miss Granger in the infirmary, hoping that someone would find it and report it. When that didn’t happen, they immediately told Lord Nott what they discovered, and the Auror Department was mobilised. Had it not been for their actions, who knows how many students would have been taken before the evacuation.”

Harry could only stare.

“How did you not… I mean, how could only they have –”

“But you believed Miss Granger capable of being the only one to figure it out, didn’t you?” His professor just sighed when Harry remained quiet. “The thing to understand, Mr. Potter, is that Headmaster Dumbledore, however well-intended, is not unflawed. A lot of the information Theo acquired was being kept a secret from this faculty. The dead roasters, the spider community hidden within the forest, and even the circumstances of Moaning Myrtle’s death were known to Albus alone. Much of it was only brought to light because Mr Malfoy charmed Myrtle into spilling secrets from fifty years ago.”

“You’re saying that he knew all along?”

“I am saying, Mr. Potter, that I am sure that Albus had a very good guess about what was happening, and his insistence on not letting the Ministry interfere at Hogwarts might have kept him from taking the radical measures the situation called for.” She massaged her temples again. “Make no mistake, Mr. Potter, the Ministry and Hogwarts are better off as independent institutions, if history has taught us anything, but, at times, alliances are necessary, however unpleasant they might be.”

“Are you talking about the Slytherins?”

McGonagall looked at him with such sadness, Harry had a hard time not apologising for whatever it was that he had said that had upset her so much, “The sooner you see that Hogwarts Houses play no role outside of this castle, Mr. Potter, the clearer things will be for you. I advise you to do so quickly.”

Harry didn’t understand what she meant. Though he also didn’t think she was expecting him to.

He wondered if he should feel insulted…

“What is the punishment?” He asked her instead.

“Fifty points will be taken from you and Mr. Weasley each – for every infraction of the school rules I could trace back to the two of you.” She said solemnly. “You will start the next year in detention, as will Mr. Weasley, and if you insist on cocooning these kinds of situations, Mr. Potter, I will revoke your Quidditch privileges on the spot. Are we clear?”

“Yes, Professor McGonagall.”

“Very well, then.” She said, standing. “Now, why don’t you go to the infirmary, too? I am sure Miss Granger has awoken, and Mr. Weasley might appreciate some company while his sister is examined. I shall go to Albus’ office and see if he and Lucius Malfoy are finally done trying to rip out each other’s throats.”

Harry was nodding when things started to slowly come back to him, since the first time he met Lucius Malfoy in that bookstore in Diagon Alley…. And then to a moment ago when Ginny said where she first found Riddle’s diary in the first place.

“Professor?” Harry called McGonagall before she could rush away. “I-I… there might be something else. I’m pretty sure… I mean, I reckon that… uhm… Lucius Malfoy put that diary in Ginny’s things. He meant for her to find it – so he could have an excuse to turn the Board against Headmaster Dumbledore and suspend him. I… I think I saw him – putting the diary in Ginny’s things. And Malfoy, too – Malfoy spent the year looking for the diary. I bet he was covering up for his dad.”

“He wasn’t, Mr. Potter.” McGonagall said simply before turning away, not acknowledging anything else Harry had said. And now it all made sense. Every single last piece that had been teasing his brain, almost at the surface, but still had not fully clicked.

McGonagall knew everything – Tom Riddle, the possession, Moaning Myrtle. And, if Dumbledore didn’t tell her, if he never told anyone, then it could only mean that Nott and Malfoy did. The two Slytherins who charmed the ghost no one could stand for long enough to ask her how she had died. The two Slytherins who happened upon the diary and knew what it could be, who knew more about the Chamber than anyone else had ever bothered to question before. Who spent their time flying over forbidden corners of Hogwarts and must have happened upon the community of spiders. Who were crazy enough to dare each other to go into the Forbidden Forest during Winter, and they happened to cross the dead roasters.

The two Slytherins who had no love lost for Lucius Malfoy – though his son did fear him.

Nott would have never opened his trap before he could claim the credit, and he wouldn’t risk his mother pulling him out of the school. But Malfoy… the blonde didn’t want Dumbledore to know what he did, but he had never said anything about McGonagall.

Harry wondered what Nott and Malfoy were doing now. If they were mocking him in their Common Room. Or if maybe Malfoy was pacing up and down, hoping that no one would let his father know about the role he played in ultimately messing up the scheme of keeping Dumbledore suspended indefinitely.

Harry was still dwelling on it, looking over the window on McGonagall’s office, when he saw his professor on the opposite tower of the castle, climbing up a caracol staircase that definitely did not lead to the headmaster’s office.

What was she doing going to the Astronomy Tower anyway?

Harry figured he wasn’t needed at the Hospital Wing and, given recent discoveries, he also didn’t even want to be welcome into the Headmaster’s office. And he also didn’t fancy going back to his own Common Room, where he would have to explain that he had lost his House no less than fifty points… again.

Following McGonagall seemed like his best bet for postponing the inevitable. And, if Harry were to be honest with himself, his Transfiguration Professor had become a riddle. He had never craved her attention until she had bestowed so much of it onto Theo Nott. Only that now he also craved her approval. He craved the same kind of understanding she had given the Slytherins.

What better way to accomplish that than to understand her a little bit more in return?

Harry winced slightly when he got to the base of the tower, and his first step onto the metal staircase echoed in the empty space. It seemed as if even the wind had decided to be still for a moment, to allow the castle a moment of silent solitude as its secrets unravelled.

A smart part of him wondered if maybe this was a sign for him to respect it. Respect secrets. And respect that some of them were better off buried.

Could the darkness of the Astronomy be a plea for him to leave it undisturbed? To ignore the starry sky and the cold clouds invading the round landing and obscuring the gold ellipses guarding the telescope at its centre?

He wondered if he would be punished for it when he pushed himself forward and, stopping at the very base underneath the telescope, Harry hid in the shadows at the sight of heeled shoes and long skirts.

McGonagall wasn’t alone. No, she, too, had been indifferent to the cold, to the frost, warning her away from that place. She had, too, left the darkness’ request for privacy unacknowledged and rivalled the regime of silence when she stopped next to Ravenna Nott, both of them staring ahead with their arms crossed as if they shared no animosity towards each other.

All it would take was one gush for them to fall through the glassless windows.

“I wonder sometimes,” McGonagall said lowly, “if you were ever genuine.” Before Lady Nott could protest, she huffed in a very un-professor-like fashion and continued, “Then you come here – and I know you were.”

Harry didn’t think Lady Nott would answer after a small eternity ticked passed, but then she sighed – guard down, he dared say. Not trusting, just… tired, “You are trespassing into dangerous waters, Minerva.”

Harry kept himself from yelping when McGonagall just scoffed aggressively, “You overestimate yourself, Ravenna. And you underestimate me – you always have.” She said, voice once more even. Still, they never looked at each other. Like young children playing hide and seek – if they couldn’t see, neither could anyone else see them. They were hidden. “I know you – and you can’t fool me, Ravenna.”

Another exhausted sigh, “I slip – at times.” She confessed to something, Harry didn’t understand. “Unfortunately, I find that I don’t want to stop – slipping, that is. It… it keeps me sane – these slips.” She then caressed the bird, Harry hadn’t noticed perched on her shoulder.

Silent. Tame. Almost… in love with her.

“Why keep Bird in that cage, Minerva?” She asked – weak. For once, Lady Nott was weak.

McGonagall inhaled deeply, her gaze seeking something in the darkening sky that Harry didn’t know if she found, “Because I know how he was created. And I knew you would come.” She sighed. Not tired like Lady Nott, not exactly. Just defeated. In pain, for some reason. “I wanted to see its reaction. See if he still… I wanted to see if he was still suffering because of you.”

“I… I’m sorry.” Lady Nott whispered, and Harry hated it, but he really did think she meant it.

“It consoles me to know he is not the only one.” At Lady Nott’s alarm, McGonagall did turn to her. And she touched her arm. Not warmly, but out of something like duty. And seeking the approval of the crow perched on that skinny shoulder dressed in silk. “Ravenna, maybe you can still –”

“I tried everything, Minerva.” Lady Nott hissed, ripping the professor’s hand away from her with a violent jerk and a step away. “The choice I had to make was not fair.”

“What choice was it?” McGonagall’s stare was like an electric drill, but Lady Nott still didn’t cave. She still didn’t bulge. She only stared back with a smile. A wet, deranged smile that told… that told Harry that that woman, that queen, had nothing else to lose. “You might’ve fooled everyone else, Ravenna, but I know him. And I got to know Theo. And I’ve noticed it.” Her exasperation grew; it unravelled as her control started to slowly slip. “You knew I would notice it, Ravenna, and I do wonder if you didn’t want me to notice it all along! Is this the choice you made? Is this why you –?”

Harry was starving for sense. He was starving to hear more. He was even starving for the tears he was sure his professor was about to shed, but Lady Nott took yet another step back, and it was like her resolve had steeled once more.

“Theo shouldn’t have to carry the burden of you wanting him to be someone else, Minerva.” She said silkily, tone far too much like velvet to have delivered such a slap as the one which seemed to have hit McGonagall across her face. “You should stop wondering already. There is nothing there, Minerva. There will never be – however much you and even I might wish it were the case.”

Harry almost fell in surprise when his professor’s wand fell unceremoniously when she reached for Lady Nott. When she grabbed Lady Nott by her skinny wrist and used force to restrain her in place. And, in that moment, Harry flashed back to when Nott forgot the wand in his pocket and punched Percy in the jaw without blinking. He flashed back to the uncontrolled expression in Nott’s face when his emotions erupted so hotly, he forgot to keep himself in check. He forgot to pretend composure.

And this is exactly what happened to McGonagall now, as she kept Lady Nott in place, locked by her grip and imprisoned by her gaze, regardless of how much the other witch squirmed.

Who was he? Who was this person McGonagall so desperately wanted back – wanted Nott to be?

“Why did you come here?” Lady Nott asked finally. “What the fuck do you want, Minerva? I can’t turn back time any more than you can!”

Harry frowned once McGonagall spoke next, “Does your husband still have a passion for ballet, Ravenna? Or was it only the ballerina he was interested in?”

Of all the insults hurled at her, all the insinuations she mocked, all the curses she brushed off with a smirk and a more acid remark… this was what could set Lady Nott off?

Ballet?

She trashed in place like a toddler, looking around herself as if an inquisitor would appear out of thin air. And she looked down at the Hogwarts grounds, lips pursing and fists clenching when McGonagall finally let go of her. Harry followed the steel blue gaze, and he had to squint to make out the figures on the grounds below.

There were three dots around Hagrid’s cabin. A bulking one, Harry knew to be the Grounds Keeper recently released from jail. A smaller, almost invisible one, following sparks that could only be Zelda and the fairies, his father had taken her to sit.

Which meant that the third one, the one sitting on the steps of Hagrid’s cabin next to him, seemingly talking to him as if they were equal, could only be… Lord Nott.

Harry never knew they were familiar with each other. Never once had Hagrid breathed a word about it – not even to say that he shouldn’t have said anything a second later.

“Don’t go poking into things you have no idea about, Minerva.” Lady Nott hissed. “You will hurt more than just me.” Harry took a step back, once more terrified of her, when that witch smirked. Then he faulted himself for having believed a word out of her mouth when he thought her capable of being humane. “And do you really think someone as spineless as Lorcan can survive the consequences of your little blackmail?”

“Why cling to him if he is so spineless, Ravenna?” When Lady Nott kept her mouth shut, her threat hanging in the air, McGonagall started pacing. And Harry finally saw what Hermione had hinted at so many times. He finally understood why Headmaster Dumbledore and the Weasleys were so wary of the Slytherins. And he once more believed them right.

McGonagall’s principles, her conscience, wouldn’t allow her to hurt someone else. Not even Lorcan Nott. She had blackmailed, and Lady Nott had called her bluff, proving what Harry now also knew: McGonagall’s integrity, her selflessness, would never allow her to go through with it, even if this was her best bargaining chip.

“I just want answers, Ravenna.” McGonagall admitted, her defeat clear. “You owe me that. You owe me the truth of what happened eleven years ago because, every time I dig deeper, the further I get from him.”

“Take this as a sign, then.” Lady Nott drawled back indifferently. “And leave this alone.”

“I can’t!” Harry startled when McGonagall shouted before inhaling again, keeping herself in check. “You know I can’t. He was – he is – like a son to me. They both are.”

“Then where the fuck were you when your sons needed you the most?” Lady Nott snapped back. “Where the fuck were you, Minerva, when we needed you?! When Dumbledore trusted that rat with James’ life and he… -- where were you?”

Harry almost screamed at her to keep going. Almost screamed at her to tell him more.

But then again – could he really believe a word out of her mouth? Was he – and McGonagall, for that matter – supposed to believe that Ravenna Nott gave a single damn about his father?

Harry shook his head. He wouldn’t fall for that. But he noticed that McGonagall wasn’t as strong-willed…

“I was trying to protect them from Albus! And from you!” McGonagall threw her hands in the air again. “You always thought you could do no wrong, Ravenna, but you never saw what your little schemes could do to him. You shielded yourself, but what about him? What about James? And Reggie? What about them?”

“Everything I did was for him.” Lady Nott looked around again and lowered her tone. Harry almost couldn’t hear…. “Even keeping Lorcan on a leash, Minerva. Everything was for him. To keep him safe. To give us a fighting chance.”

“Everything you did was so that you could have a fighting chance. So that you could have an escape.” McGonagall hissed back. “Or do you wish to tell me that you made that girl disappear to protect my boys, too?”

“I needed Lorcan. We needed Lorcan, Minerva.” Lady Nott insisted vehemently and, despite not understanding a word of what they were saying, Harry knew his professor was sceptical. “I couldn’t risk him choosing that girl over me – over everything.”

“A Muggle girl, Ravenna.” McGonagall breathed out. “Someone who could have actually made a difference and whose only mistake was crossing paths with you. Is she even alive?”

“I never touched her, Minerva.” Lady Nott said cryptically.

“Lorcan would never –”

“How sure are you?” McGonagall was interrupted, and Lady Nott nodded when the other witch remained silent. “Maybe you are right, and I did everything to protect myself, but I did try, Minerva. I did everything I could think of – before and after that night.”

McGonagall just stared at her, lips once more crisped, “You are very smart, Ravenna. Very cunning.” His professor said. “And that’s precisely why I don’t believe a word that came out of your mouth. If you were really trying to protect them, you would never have done what you did. You wouldn’t have dragged Lorcan into this. And you would have seen what was right in front of your face the moment Lorcan started to pull away from you.”

“I –”

“You were selfish, Ravenna. You were vain – and once more the people around you paid the price for it.” McGonagall adjusted her skirts, composure once more intact. Voice once more lecturing – the same emotionless tone she used during her classes. “You do not wish to tell me the truth – I accept that. But be aware that I will continue to look for the answers I have been denied, and I will free him, even if it means throwing you back in that hellhole.”

If she was scared, Lady Nott didn’t show it – she just scoffed, “Where was that determination when he was being arrested, Minerva? Might have come in handy to overrule Dumbledore’s bullshit.”

“It was being wasted with the Minister of Magic and the Department of Law Enforcement, Ravenna.” McGonagall hissed. “It was wasted chasing after witnesses, alibis, scattered memories from dead bodies and lawyers who would plead his case. And it was about to pay off – until you had Lorcan take you out and you lied through your teeth to clean your name. Albus might have been the reason he was denied a trial, but you made sure he could never hope to be free.”

This time, McGonagall was the one lacking any resemblance of compassion. She merely watched as Lady Nott paled, and a trembling hand covered her gaping mouth. She mumbled a denial, barely above a whisper, but it was dismayed.

Whatever it was they were talking about, McGonagall hadn’t lied. She didn’t lie – and that made her the better witch. Something, Harry suspected, Lady Nott had just started to really realise.

“You might be smart, Ravenna, but you are not invincible.” McGonagall continued. “And, if you were just a little less self-obsessed, you would have realised sooner that I would have never given up on him – on any of them.”

Harry sincerely thought Lady Nott would be sick, “Are… are they alive? James? Reggie?”

His own heart stopped for a moment, but then McGonagall shook her head curtly, “Not due to my lack of trying, if you haven’t figured.” She turned to leave, and Harry hurried to hide, but then she stopped again. He only heard her sighing. “If keeping Bird told me anything, it is that he still cares for you, so I will tell you this, Ravenna. Stop lying to Lorcan – he is not as spineless as you think he is.”

Harry wished he could see Lady Nott’s face, “Love is a curse, Minerva – Lorcan’s especially.” She said lowly. “And he loved her – the ballerina. He stood mesmerised in that audience, watching the same mind-numbing performance day in and day out. He had never spoken to her at that point, but he still went there, he waited until the stage went dark, and he stayed there, rooted to the seat like a moron. I was quick to dismiss it – he has always been a bit pathetic like that. But then, one night, that girl found him and she didn’t think him pathetic. And then Lorcan started to be too busy for me, too busy even for the Dark Lord, can you believe that? He was going to jeopardise everything – everything I worked so hard for – to be with that ballerina. And she was no power struggle, no possibility of escape framed by rose-tinted glasses like I was to him. Just two people who smiled at each other once. I couldn’t let that happen, Minerva – I needed him.”

Harry heard his professor sigh, “He thinks she is dead, Ravenna. He thinks he is the reason she died.”

“And that brought him right back to me. One word about her and he did everything I asked – even created an alibi.”

“He has always been too delicate to be a Slytherin. Too delicate to be your husband, Ravenna.” McGonagall whispered. “Does he know about the part you played?”

“He doesn’t.” She admitted flatly.

“And do you plan on ever letting him out of his misery?” McGonagall pressed. “He deserves to know, Ravenna – he deserves to know if that girl is still alive, that it wasn’t his fault. He shouldn’t have to live with the guilt.”

“The guilt is what keeps him clinging to me – to Theo.” Lady Nott hissed. “So, yes, I will let him die thinking that he is the reason the love of his life is dead, and I am not going to apologise for it, Minerva. Not to him and certainly not to you. His misery, his obsession with convincing himself that he is happy with me, that he has always loved me, to numb the pain and his guilt, means that my son is protected. It means my immunity. And he fucking owes me that, too.” She started to breathe heavily. “I might not be the perfect wife and ours might not be the perfect marriage, but Lorcan also has some corpses piled up in his closet, too.”

McGonagall only spoke after a beat, “And after saying all that, do you still think him spineless?” His professor exhaled. “Lorcan keeps his resentment and his anger at bay out of devotion for his children, Ravenna, but even someone as kind as him is bound to explode eventually – and you have always had a talent for pushing people to their limit.”

“Lorcan would never lift a finger at me – he doesn’t have the guts.”

Harry didn’t think Lady Nott was so sure, especially when McGonagall clicked her tongue, “Are you sure about that?” She asked sceptically. “Where is your wand, Ravenna?” He heard Lady Nott gulping, and he could picture his professor nodding her head, like she did at her students when they were going in the right direction, but not quite there yet. “You’re fortunate none of the people who desire you dead seem to have noticed that you are defenceless.”

“It was an agreement.” Lady Nott mumbled.

“Maybe.” McGonagall conceded. “And I reckon you agreed because your magic has always been protective. Just don’t forget that, however spineless, your husband has always been a formidable duellist. There was a reason Tom Riddle was so keen on recruiting him.”