The wizard stared in awe at an ornate mirror. It looked centuries old, like most of the junk in this room, but this was fancier than most of it and gave off an aura of powerful magic.
"Bode, you found something?" a voice called.
"Oh God! I can see forever!" he said in awe.
"Bode?"
"Croaker, you have to see this! I can see it! I understand everything!"
"Bode, what in Merlin's name are you talking about?" Croaker rushed over to his fellow Unspeakable.
"Come look! Everything we ever wanted is right here in the mirror."
"What?" What the hell kind of mirror was Bode looking at, Croaker wondered. He stepped into view of it slowly, not going far enough to see his own reflection, and examined the frame. "Erised stra ehru oyt ube cafru oyt on wohsi," he muttered. "I show not your face, but your heart's desire. Merlin, it's the Mirror of Erised!" What was this doing here? He'd heard rumours about it, but it was supposed to be in Flamel's private collection…but then, Flamel had died a few months ago. Had he left it to Dumbledore—? Never mind. "Bode, come away from there! It's not real!"
"Croaker, I can see it! All the secrets of magic are right there!"
"I side come away from there!" Croaker grabbed his friend's arm and pulled him out of view of the reflection. Suddenly, Bode raised his fist to strike, but he hesitated when he saw Croaker's face.
"Oh, God, I just got whammied, didn't I?" he said.
"Yeah. You're lucky I was here." Croaker conjured a sheet to cover the Mirror and wrote a label detailing what it was and instructing it to be sent back to the Department of Mysteries. He also made a note on his parchment pad in case Dumbledore wanted it back later. "One of Flamel's toys," he said. "I swear, we're gonna be mopping up after him for the next decade, and that was before we found this place."
"Yikes. This is gonna be a long day, isn't it."
"Definitely." He called out to the rest of his team, "Look alive, people! We've got Flamel-level artifacts in here, and we're just getting started. Don't trust anything you see. It wouldn't surprise me if we managed to find Ravenclaw's Lost Diadem in here, and even I don't know what that thing does." He looked around for a minute. "And does anyone know a good way to get those pixies out of the rafters? It makes me nervous enough when everything in a place like this is non-living."
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"Croaker's talking about at least a week just to sort everything in that room," Amelia told Albus. "And that's just to move everything out of there and into a few categorised storage spaces. He says three weeks if we want to avoid taking dangerous shortcuts, and he wouldn't even give me an estimate for how long it'll take to catalogue everything."
"Tell him there is no hurry as long as the school can reopen in the autumn," Albus replied. "I spoke to the Hogwarts elves. It seems they did know of the room and used it for storage regularly. It can take different forms depending on the needs of the user. I will place them at Mr. Croaker's disposal if he wants them."
"He might. Moody reports the search of the school is proceeding on schedule. That acromantula colony in the Forest worries me, but other than that, they haven't found anything significant. If that really was the only basilisk, we shouldn't have to waste more than a few more days on it."
"That is good to hear."
"Harry told me about Quirrell," she said, and with her keen eye, she saw Dumbledore's face twitch. "Under the circumstances, though, I'll provisionally forget to record the fishy-sounding bits of his story and accept that didn't realise you actually had You-Know-Who in the school. After all, he's officially dead, and Quirrell couldn't possibly have been possessed by a dead man—so if we make sure he stays that dead, I'm willing to call it no harm, no foul."
Dumbledore was clearly aware that he'd been caught on his back foot. "I…I appreciate your generosity, Amelia," he managed.
"Good. Now, let's talk horcruxes." She thumbed through the report he had given her. It was surprisingly thick given the amount of time he'd had available, and he must have had large parts of it prepared in advance. "If there's one thing I can tell you I'm genuinely grateful for, it's that you were so thorough. You've got You-Know-Who's family history, his birth, the orphanage he was raised in, his habits, his friends and enemies in school, objects of importance to him, a record of his murders—This information must have been collected over decades. If I didn't know better, I'd say you were harbouring an obsession, Albus."
He smiled weakly at her. "Know thy enemy, Amelia. I believe this information gives us crucial clues to finding Voldemort's horcruxes."
"And I hope you're right," Amelia said. "Right now, all you've got is a ring, a locket, and a cup, each more speculative than the last. You don't even know if there are any others, let alone what they are. Incidentally, how long have you known about these three?"
"As you said, the memories I collected over many years, but I did not know which parts were significant until I reviewed them last night. I am aware that my record is woefully incomplete, but I believe that if we investigate the orphanage where Tom Riddle grew up, as well as his mother's home, we may find more clues."
"Fair enough. I'll add them to our to-do list. In the meantime, I'll circulate this list of items to the Aurors and Unspeakables as cursed objects we suspect the Heir of Slytherin may have left behind. Anything else on this front?"
Albus grew solemn and sighed heavily. "Since we are operating under strictest secrecy, did you speak to the Healer who treated Harry at St. Mungo's?"
Amelia looked down and shuffled some papers around her desk. "I think I have a report from him somewhere. I was going to use it for the case against Harry's relatives. Why?"
"Molly Weasley reported to me that the Healer found a latent concentration of dark magic in Harry's scar—dark magic that was likely as old as the scar itself. It doesn't appear to be hurting him, but…I have a theory, Amelia, which is little more than a guess at present, and which I am unsure as yet how to test. But here is what I know. When Voldemort tried to kill Harry that night, he used the Killing Curse. The magical residue confirmed that at the time. The Killing Curse was reflected by an extremely obscure Protection of Love ward—reflected back at Voldemort, whose soul was already damaged beyond all knowledge from creating multiple horcruxes. I believe it is possible that when he was struck, a piece of his soul broke off and, in the absence of a prepared horcrux vessel, latched onto the only living thing left in that room."
Albus stopped talking, but Amelia didn't register it for several seconds. She became aware that she had dropped her papers and tidied them again. "Good Lord," she whispered. "You think Harry could be a horcrux?"
"As I said, it is an uncertain theory—"
"But if there's even a small chance, we have to investigate it," she finished. "Your evidence?"
"Harry can speak Parseltongue, an ability he likely got from Voldmort. He suffers headaches in Voldemort's presence—beyond the level of ordinary Legilimency. He remembers the night his parents were murdered—"
"He does?!"
"He claims he remembers only green light, but the fact that he remembers anything at all of that night is unheard of for a child of fifteen months. It could very well be connected."
"Any evidence against?"
"The fact that his friends have not been corrupted as Ginny Weasley was. Even if Harry himself is protected, the horcrux should have had a dark influence on the minds of those close to him."
"His relatives?" she asked, suddenly wondering if those cretins' actions were truly their own.
"It is possible they were influenced by the horcrux, but since Ronald Weasley and Hermione Granger have not been, I deem it unlikely."
Amelia grumbled darkly and made some notes in her secret, personal files. "I don't like it Albus. This could complicate things in so many ways…Alright, suppose the boy is a horcrux. Do you know any way to…to…"
"Remove it safely? I'm afraid not. I consulted all of my books on the subject, and all of the known ways to destroy a horcrux would kill Harry before they killed the soul fragment, except possibly, as an extreme last resort, the Dementor's Kiss."
Amelia had to play back his last words in her head to make sure she hadn't misheard. The Dementor's Kiss? On the Boy Who Lived? To her credit she didn't explode at Albus, but thought it through first. Obviously, he meant for the dementor to suck the horcrux out while leaving Harry's soul intact, but who was to say that was even possible? "You're right about that, Albus," she said. "Extreme last resort—like if You-Know-Who is back in the flesh and coming to kill us all. Do you think the Unspeakables could find an alternate solution?"
"Anything is possible, Amelia. But first, I would suggest having Mr. Croaker see if he can confirm my theory."
"You're going to be the death of me, Albus. Alright, I'll add it to the list. Please tell me that's all."
"For now, it should be. Alas, I have delayed the Board of Governors as long as I can, and I must now face them…Incidentally, I believe several of them may be willing to testify in your case against Lucius Malfoy. They claimed privately that he had threatened their families when they reinstated me."
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"Naturally, when Harry informed me that the monster was a basilisk, I took immediate, drastic steps to protect the students and handed the situation over to the DMLE in accordance with Ministry and international law. I believe you know the rest," Dumbledore finished his story to the Board.
"Yes, I believe that response was appropriate," the interim chair of the Board said.
"And Malfoy will trouble us no more?" another member asked nervously.
"He was arrested yesterday," Dumbledore said. "Even if he could still wield influence here after being dismissed, he cannot physically reach us. Your cooperation with the DMLE in his trial would be invaluable to ensure he cannot trouble you again in the future."
"Fair enough. The real question is, how did you go through the entire year without realising what the monster was?"
"Or the Chamber?"
"The Chamber could only be opened by a Parselmouth and had evaded detection for a thousand years," Dumbledore insisted. "As for the basilisk. I admit to error on that point. I had considered the possibility, but I dismissed it almost immediately. You see, the basilisk in the Chamber was roughly one thousand years old. No basilisk has ever been recorded living that long. Therefore, either someone else bred a basilisk in the Chamber for the 1943 attacks—I considered this to be vanishingly unlikely, for it requires a ritual that could not have been found in the Hogwarts library even before I removed the darkest books—or Salazar Slytherin anticipated it might take that long for his heirs to work his will and took appropriate precautions to keep the beast alive. I also considered this to be unlikely. After all, why should he have thought it would take anywhere near that long? Unfortunately I was wrong."
"And the Heir?" the interim chair said.
"I of course considered Voldemort—" The Board flinched. "—but I had solid intelligence that he was out of the country. I searched for an agent acting in his stead, but the artifact that possessed Miss Weasley was clever and did not manifest any signs in my viewing, and since it managed to fool her own brothers, it is unsurprising—though unfortunate—that we missed her."
The Board all nodded solemnly and debated amongst themselves for a long while. Eventually, they decided to accept Dumbledore's explanation and concluded that he had performed due diligence in his running of the school over the past year.
"That only leaves the matter of Miss Weasley's punishment," the interim chair said.
Dumbledore's bushy eyebrows rose. "Surely, we cannot punish a young girl for what she did while she was possessed," he said, aghast. "She has already been through enough."
"She failed to report a basilisk in the castle, Albus!" another member said. "That's a serious offence."
"But she did not know that the monster was a basilisk," he responded. "Indeed, she did not know anything for certain—no more than the rest of the students. She was under no legal obligation to report it, and failure to report such a potential danger is also not an expellable offence for students not in a leadership position."
"Well…perhaps not, but her actions nearly caused the closure of the school—"
"They did cause the closure of the school."
"—yes, and nearly ruined it forever. We can't let that go unanswered."
"I strongly advise you not to pursue expulsion," Dumbledore said, and he smiled a little. "If you do, I fear the next action of Harry Potter would be to retain a solicitor and file a lawsuit to overturn the action on her behalf."
The Board was silent for a minute. "That is…oddly specific, Headmaster," the chair said. "Why would you anticipate such a thing?"
"Between Mr. Potter's friendship and his devotion to the Weasley family, I think the logic is quite straightforward," he said. And if it takes a little extra nudge from me, so be it, he added mentally.
"I see…expulsion is a little excessive. Still, there ought to be some response."
Dumbledore smiled a bit more, "If it makes you feel better, I can suspend Miss Weasley for the remainder of the term."
"The term's already over, you dingbat!"
"And punishments cannot carry over to the next term," he replied. "How convenient."
"I propose we backdate the suspension to the twenty-ninth of May, when Miss Weasley entered the Chamber," another suggested. "With such a serious lapse in judgement, I'm not comfortable leaving it unremarked on her record."
Dumbledore was not pleased by that. He continued to argue in Ginny's favour, but he was unable to dissuade the Board from their punishment. It wouldn't really make any practical difference, but he didn't like adding an extra hurt such as this to that family.
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Dumbledore decided to break the news to the Weasleys in person mainly because he needed to speak to Harry about getting tested by Croaker. Of course, Croaker was very busy and likely would be for some time, but he thought it would be best to ease the boy into it before dropping the final bombshell on him.
"Oh man, I'm really sorry, Ginny. I didn't want you to get in trouble," Harry said when he found out.
"It's okay, Harry," Ginny said sullenly.
"But it wasn't your fault," he insisted. "I never wanted to cause any trouble. I thought everything would be taken care of when I killed the basilisk. I didn't know it would cause so much trouble when I told about it."
"We certainly don't blame you," Mrs. Weasley assured him. "And you had to tell us about the basilisk. All of this is Old Slytherin's fault for hiding such a dangerous beast in the castle."
"Still, it's not fair. I know how it felt when everyone thought I was the Heir. It was awful. I don't like them blaming Ginny."
Dumbledore cleared his throat: "That's very noble of you, Harry. But I'm sure the suspension will not reflect poorly on Ginny, especially with you vouching for her. But I also wanted to speak to you directly. You see, Mrs. Weasley mentioned to me that the Healer found an unusual concentration of dark magic infusing your scar."
Harry looked at Mrs. Weasley questioningly. "I thought it was important, and that the Headmaster should know in case it troubled you later," she said. "There's no one better at arcane magic than Professor Dumbledore, after all…I hope you don't mind."
The boy shrugged and said, "It's okay."
Dumbledore smiled at her: "I appreciate your loyalty, Molly, but Madam Bones recently reminded me that there is someone better than I: Algernon Croaker, the Head Unspeakable. Harry, if you don't mind, I believe he should examine your scar to better ascertain the nature of this dark magic and determine if any action needs to be taken."
"It's from Voldemort isn't it?" he asked. "The Healer said it probably came with my scar."
The boy caught on quickly, didn't he? "Yes, Harry," he replied. "I believe that when Voldemort attempted to kill you that night, some of…his magic remained attached to you. This is very likely why you can speak Parseltongue, as well."
"Can you get rid of it? I don't want any part of him in me. I've seen what it can do."
"That is what I very much hope to be able to do," he said, and it was the truest thing he could say. "Now, Mr. Croaker is currently very busy searching the Lost and Found at Hogwarts, so you shan't need to worry about this for a very weeks, but please be prepared for when I call you for him to examine you."
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Amelia was definitely surprised when Algernon Croaker burst into her office on Saturday. The search of the rest of the castle was winding down, although it would probably take another week to scan the whole building for expanded spaces and be prepared to reopen the Chamber of Secrets. But she wasn't expecting to hear back from Croaker's team for a good deal longer than that.
"Mr. Croaker, what—"
"Madam Bones, you're going to want to see this," he said.
"Croaker, please tell me you didn't find a basilisk in the Lost and Found," she said.
"No, worse…We found a horcrux."
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"Not for a few weeks, huh?" Harry said as Dumbledore escorted him and Sirius down the eerie stone corridor to the Department of Mysteries. Sirius had been given a temporary release from St. Mungo's since this matter was urgent and greatly concerned his godson.
"We made an unexpected and fortuitous find," the old wizard explained. "While searching the Lost and Found, Mr. Croaker found another artifact that had been cursed by Voldemort—similar to the diary. With this direct comparison to Voldemort's magic, he can analyse your scar much more easily." A half-truth, but enough until they knew for certain. "And because this artifact was so dangerous, we did not wish to wait to deal with it."
"Like the diary?" Harry said. "There wasn't a horrible monster with this one, was there?"
"Fortunately not. There was very little living in the Room that worried us." He led the two of them into a dizzily spinning room and then called out the word, "Soul." The room slowed, and one of the doors opened, revealing a room full of ritual circles, arcane artifacts, and three people sitting around a stone table.
"That's all the security you have here?" Sirius wondered.
"I assure you, Mr. Black, we have far subtler methods than you can dream of," said a grey-haired man in a black robe.
Harry looked around the room. He recognised Madam Bones, and he'd seen the man with the false eye earlier this week, though he didn't remember his name, but the man in the black robe was unfamiliar to him. Fortunately, Dumbledore introduced them at once. "Harry, Sirius, you already know Madam Bones, but allow me to introduce you to Auror Alastor Moody and the Head of the Department of Mysteries, Algernon Croaker. And if you are wondering about this meeting, yes it is more than a simple examination for Harry. You see, the four of us have formed an undercover team to prevent Voldemort from returning yet again."
Oh, that was different. Harry and Sirius both had to wonder what they were doing here, then. "But you still want to scan Harry, though?" Sirius asked.
"That's right," Croaker said. "This should only take a minute, Mr. Potter. Please sit down in the middle of that circle." He pointed to one of the smaller runic circles on the floor. Harry sat nervously, and Croaker rose from the table and walked around him thrice whilst chanting and waving his wand. Nothing much seemed to happen, until—
"Ouch!" Harry clapped a hand to his forehead where his scar suddenly felt searing hot.
Croaker immediately looked grim. "Well, you were right, Albus," he said to Dumbledore who looked equally grim.
"What's going on?" Sirius asked.
"Sirius, Harry, please sit. I'm afraid we have bad news," Dumbledore said. They sat and looked expectantly. "Harry, I confess I wasn't entirely forthcoming the last time we spoke. I wanted to wait until I had confirmation, and unfortunately, Mr. Croaker has confirmed my theory. The dark magic bound to your scar is not merely a strange magical nexus…it is, in fact, a piece of Voldemort's soul."
Sirius made a hissing noise that sounded oddly more like a cat than a dog. Harry felt vaguely ill, but the only thing he could think of to say was, "You can have pieces of souls?"
"Bugger, he didn't," Sirius muttered.
"He didn't what?" Harry asked.
Sirius quickly downed his extra, emergency dose of Calming Draught and took a deep breath. "It's called a horcrux, Harry. My parents warned me about them, but I never thought I'd actually…It's a piece of someone's soul torn off by a ritual murder and stored in an…object. As long as the horcrux exists, Voldemort can't die."
Harry's eyes widened, and he ran his fingers over his scar nervously. He wasn't sure how to respond to that.
"How…how could this happen?" Sirius demanded. "Voldemort can't have meant to…"
"I don't believe he did," Dumbledore said.
"I'm sure he didn't," Croaker confirmed. "Mr. Black, the good news is that Harry isn't a true horcrux. There's a very complicated and dark preparatory ritual that you're probably better off not knowing. The point is, it wasn't used on your godson…The bad news is that there's more than one horcrux."
"There is?"
"This sort of thing doesn't happen by accident, Black," Moody growled. "The bastard made a bunch of them. At least the lad's already destroyed one."
Sirius looked to Harry in surprise. Harry saw the eyes on him and thought back to the only thing that made sense. "The diary?"
"Aye. You did us a favour there," Moody said.
"Wow, but…but you can get this one out of my scar, right?" he said. "Preferably in a way that doesn't involve a giant snake?"
Moody and Sirius both chuckled darkly, but the rest of the table remained solemn. Croaker seemed to stare at Harry's scar as he said, "We don't have a safe way to get it out right now, Mr. Potter, but that's why we're here. We were lucky enough to find another of You-Know-Who's horcruxes at Hogwarts. I know, I'm as surprised as you are. But now that we have one in hand, I can study it to try to figure out a way to remove the soul piece from you safely."
"Oh…that's good, I guess," Harry said, but he sounded disappointed.
"That does raise another question, though," Sirius spoke up. "I assume there are other horcruxes out there. Can we destroy them without a giant snake? I seem to remember it's supposed to be really hard."
"Actually, that is the easy part, Sirius," Dumbledore said. "The Sword of Gryffindor is made of goblin silver. This makes it unique in that it can absorb basilisk venom without being harmed itself, and with it, can destroy horcruxes."
"Easier than that, Albus," Croaker countered. "We can just run across the hall and throw them through the Veil of Death and not bother with the sword."
Harry was pretty lost by now. The Ministry of Magic had something called the Veil of Death? Like…an actual veil to actual death? And he thought magic was weird before. Well, it probably wasn't any weirder than soul pieces, but still. Maybe he should be paying more attention to Hermione. It sounded like he still had a lot to learn.
"Ahem," Moody grunted. "I think we're missing the obvious danger, here. You-Know-Who is still out there, and if he's any kind of smart, he'll know we've destroyed the diary and confiscated the diadem. Should we really keep the thing intact here, knowing he'll try to get it?"
"It's a priceless artifact, Auror Moody," Croaker gasped. "Tainted or not. And I needed it to find a way to help Mr. Potter."
"That won't help us if You-Know-Who comes back."
"That's enough, Alastor," Madam Bones cut him off. "But he does raise a good point, Mr. Croaker. How can we make sure the diadem stays safe—and doesn't possess anybody?"
"I had a few thoughts to that, Madam Bones," Croaker said confidently. "First, we need to put it under 'round-the-clock guard, and we won't let anyone handle it unsupervised. But for a longer-term solution, after we harvest the basilisk corpse from the Chamber of Secrets, we can set up a dead man's switch where if something goes wrong, or if an unauthorised person tries to access the diadem, it'll be doused with basilisk venom and destroyed. And worst comes to worst, we can always throw the thing through the Veil of Death like the others."
"Fair enough. Mr. Black, Mr. Potter, I want you to know we're bringing you into this little group out of necessity. This operation is off the books. Fudge doesn't know, and, more importantly, he doesn't want to know. Ideally, we'll want to destroy all the horcruxes and then quietly release a report by the Headmaster and Mr. Croaker saying that You-Know-Who definitely can't come back anyone, and no one will be the wiser. If we play this right, we'll be able to stop a second war before it even starts."
"Sounds good to me," Sirius agreed. "What do you need us to do?"
"For now, just focus on recovering your strength. And don't tell anyone. In a couple weeks, we'll want Harry to reopen the Chamber of Secrets, and we might call on you to help us search for horcruxes. And there might be a few other small favours. There's still a lot to be done, after all. I was hoping Albus would bring you up to speed?"
Dumbledore then proceeded to tell them all he knew about Voldemort's horcruxes, and a grim sense of determination settled on Harry and Sirius. This wasn't going to be easy. They had only partial clues to what the horcruxes were and where they were, but they were going to make sure he was gone for good this time. As for what to do next, Dumbledore thought interviewing Voldemort's old schoolteachers might yield some clues.
A/N: Just one chapter to go. No, this won't be a long story-more like a "see how quickly everything gets solved if they have an excuse to dig up all the secrets" story.