The Mysterious Heir

Chapter 13, Book 1, "The two faced snake"

(TW: blood, loss of a body part, attempted murder)

It is Quirrell.

"You!" gasps Harry.

Quirrell smiles. His face isn't twitching at all.

"Me," he says calmly. "I wondered whether I'd be meeting you here, Potter."

"But I thought - Snape -"

"Severus?" Quirrell laughs, and it isn't his usual quivering treble, either, but cold and sharp. "Yes, Severus does seem the type, doesn't he? So useful to have him swooping around like an overgrown bat. Next to him, who would suspect p-p-poor, st-stuttering Professor Quirrell?"

"Is that a rhetorical question?" Harry recognizes the voice as Polaris's. He looks to his right, he sees Polaris lying on the ground, tied up. "Yes." Quirrell answers, looking down at Polaris.

Harry can't take it in. This can't be true, it can't.

"But Snape tried to kill me!"

"No, no, no. I tried to kill you. Your friend Miss Granger accidentally knocked me over as she rushed to set fire to Snape at that Quidditch match. She broke my eye contact with you. Another few seconds and I'd have got you off that broom. I'd have managed it before then if Snape hadn't been muttering a countercurse, trying to save you."

"Snape was trying to save me?"

"Of course," says Quirrell coolly. "Why do you think he wanted to referee your next match? He was trying to make sure I didn't do it again. Funny, really...he needn't have bothered. I couldn't do anything with Dumbledore watching. All the other teachers thought Snape was trying to stop Gryffindor from winning, he did make himself unpopular...and what a waste of time, when after all that, I'm going to kill you tonight."

Quirrell snaps his fingers. Ropes spring out of thin air and wrap themselves tightly around Harry.

"You're too noisy to live, Potter. Scurrying around the school on Halloween like that, for all I knew you'd seen me coming to look at what was guarding the Stone."

"You let the troll in?"

"Isn't it obvious? Are you really that stupid?" Polaris replies

"Certainly. I have a special gift with trolls - you must have seen what I did to the one in the chamber back there? Unfortunately, while everyone else was running around looking for it, Snape, who already suspected me, went straight up to the third floor to head me off - and not only did my troll fail to beat you to death, that three-headed dog didn't even manage to bite Snape's leg off properly.

"Now, wait quietly, Potter. I need to examine this interesting mirror."

It is only then that Harry realizes what is standing behind Quirrell. It's the Mirror of Erised.

"This mirror is the key to finding the Stone," Quirrell murmurs, tapping his way around the frame. "Trust Dumbledore to come up with something like this...but he's in London...I'll be far away by the time he gets back...."

All Harry can think of doing is to keep Quirrell talking and stop him from concentrating on the mirror.

"Polaris and I saw you and Snape in the forest -" he blurts out.