The Weasley of Slytherin: The Chamber of Secrets

Chapter 18: The Last Victim

"If you've finished eating, I'll take that seat, Ginny. I'm starving, I've only just come off patrol duty."

Ginny jumped up as though her chair had just been electrified, gave Percy a fleeting, frightened look, and scampered away. Percy sat down and grabbed a mug from the center of the table.

"Percy!" said Ron angrily. "She was just about to tell us something important!" Halfway through a gulp of tea, Percy choked.

"What sort of thing?" he said, coughing.

"I just asked her if she'd seen anything odd, and she started to say..."

"Oh — that — that's nothing to do with the Chamber of Secrets," said Percy at once.

"How do you know?" said Ron, his eyebrows raised.

"Well, er, if you must know, Ginny, er, walked in on me the other day when I was — well, never mind — the point is, she spotted me doing something and I, um, I asked her not to mention it to anybody. I must say, I did think she'd keep her word. It's nothing, really, I'd just rather —"

I had never seen Percy look so uncomfortable.

"What were you doing, Percy?" said Ron, grinning. "Go on, tell us, we won't laugh."

Percy didn't smile back.

"Pass me those rolls, Harry, I'm starving."

...

I knew the whole mystery might be solved tomorrow without our help, but I wasn't about to pass up a chance to speak to Myrtle if it turned up — and to my delight it did, midmorning, when we were being led to History of Magic by Gilderoy Lockhart.

I was a bit worried though as (Y/n) hasn't shown up to any of our lessons all day. It wasn't like him.

Lockhart, who had so often assured them that all danger had passed, only to be proved wrong right away, was now wholeheartedly convinced that it was hardly worth the trouble to see them safely down the corridors.

His hair wasn't as sleek as usual; it seemed he had been up most of the night, patrolling the fourth floor.

"Mark my words," he said, ushering them around a 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."

"I agree, sir," I said thinking quickly, making Ron drop his books in surprise.

"Thank you, Harry," said Lockhart graciously while we waited for a long line of another class to pass. "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," said Ron, catching on. "Why don't you leave us here, sir, we've only got one more corridor to go —"

"You know, Weasley, I think I will," said Lockhart. "I really should go and prepare my next class —"

And he hurried off.

"Prepare his class," Ron sneered after him. "Gone to curl his hair, more like."

We let the rest of the class draw ahead of us, then darted down a side passage and hurried off toward Moaning Myrtle's bathroom.

But just as we were congratulating each other on our brilliant scheme.

"Potter! Weasley! What are you doing?"
It was Professor McGonagall, and her mouth was the thinnest of thin lines.

"We were — we were —" Ron stammered. "We were going to — to go and see —"

"Hermione," I said. Ron and Professor McGonagall both looked at me.