the last verse ; harry potter [2]

twenty seven ; the chamber sings

The Chamber hummed in delight.

The cavern walls grinned. The ceiling dripped, a dull echo with each impact with the floor; it was the sound of a joyous march, each drip its own spring step. The large, carved face of Salazar Slytherin seemed to smile.

It reveled in the sight: the girl with the Slytherin blood standing within its aging walls. The Chamber detected other things within her, too: The sweet swirl of Merlin blood, the golden ichor of the Dumbledores. The Chamber felt the power within her, it pulsated against the walls, left little ripples in the dewy puddles.

The little Riddle girl whimpered upon the isle between the two small ponds. She clutched her head. What is hurting you, child?

The Horcrux, she responded out loud. It's destroyed.

The Chamber reached its gnarled, old fingers to her, lifting her to her feet.

It's time to wake her up, it said to her. The Chamber absorbed her, absolved the pain within her mind, letting it flow out her veins and into the chambers fingers. Do not worry, child, it soothed. I will take this burden for you.

The Chamber, its knobby fingers like a wisp of wind upon her back, pushed her to the engraved portrait of its Original Master. Like slight strings on a puppet, it lifted her hand and touched her fingers to it.

The Chamber let the portrait dissolve, erode, until it was only a portal of open space to an untouched corridor. A door stood at the end.

Go along, child, the Chamber urged.

The door at the end was cold beneath her fingers. It creaked open, metal scraping upon metal. A glass casket was set upon a stone dais in the center. A dark-haired woman slept, her lilac dress folded at the glass barrier.

The Chamber watched its little girl stumble to the glass, placing her palm on the side, just where her mother's porcelain hand was. At the glass lid has an intricately carved stone keyhole. Though not for a key; it was much too oddly shaped and round for that.

You could travel the world, the Chamber told her. She did not understand, and she told it so.

With the touch of a finger, any where you'd like.

The Chamber's wind-hands brushed her globe necklace. She unclasped it was trembling hands, fitting it perfectly into the hemispherical indention in the swirled stone. The glass ceiling of the casket turned to an opal film, dissolving in air, and the scent of sweet flowers filled the room. The Chamber watched the girl tremble with nerves above her mother, a beautiful mother that if the girl wanted to, she could reach out and touch.

And then Vera Beauregard opened her eyes.