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.·:*¨༺𝚈𝚎𝚊𝚛❷⇻𝙲𝚑𝚊𝚙𝚝𝚎𝚛②⑧༻¨*:·.
𝚃.𝙼 𝚁𝚒𝚍𝚍𝚕𝚎'𝚜 𝙳𝚒𝚊𝚛𝚢
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❀。• *₊°❀°。❀。• *₊° ❀
➴➵➶➴➵➶➴➵➶➴➵➶➴➵➶➴➵➶
✯¸.•'*¨'*•✿ ✿•*'¨*'•.¸✯✯¸.•'*¨'*•✿ ✿•*'¨*'•.¸✯
╔⏤⏤⏤⏤⏤⏤╝❀╚⏤⏤⏤⏤⏤⏤╗
❝𝙲𝚘𝚖𝚎 𝚘𝚗, 𝚍𝚊𝚗𝚌𝚎 𝚠𝚒𝚝𝚑 𝚖𝚎. 𝚃𝚑𝚎 𝚎𝚊𝚛𝚝𝚑 𝚒𝚜 𝚜𝚙𝚒𝚗𝚗𝚒𝚗𝚐, 𝚠𝚎 𝚌𝚊𝚗'𝚝 𝚓𝚞𝚜𝚝 𝚜𝚝𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚘𝚗 𝚒𝚝.❞
╚⏤⏤⏤⏤⏤⏤╗❀╔⏤⏤⏤⏤⏤⏤╝
As Harry, Ron and I left the hospital wing after visiting Hermione, a puddle of water began drenching my shoes. 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 what's up with her?" said Ron.
"Let's go and see," said Harry, and holding our robes over our ankles we stepped through the water.
Moaning Myrtle was crying, if possible, louder and harder than ever before.
"What's up, Myrtle?" said Harry.
"Who's that?" glugged Myrtle miserably. "Come to throw something else at me?" Harry waded across to her cubicle and said,
"Why would I throw something at you?"
"Don't ask me," Myrtle shouted, "Here I am, minding my own business, and someone thinks it's funny to throw a book at me ..."
"But it can't hurt you if someone throws something at you," said Ron, reasonably. "I mean, it'd just go right through you, wouldn't it?" He had said the wrong thing. Myrtle puffed herself up and shrieked,
"Let's all throw books at Myrtle, because she can't feel it! Ten points if you can get it through her stomach! Fifty points if it goes through her head!"
"Who threw it at you, anyway?" I asked.
"I don't know ... I was just sitting in the U-bend, thinking about death, and it fell right through the top of my head," Myrtle wept.
Harry, I, and Ron looked under the sink, where Myrtle was pointing. A small, thin book lay there. It had a shabby black cover and was as wet as everything else in the bathroom.
Harry stepped forward to pick it up, I saw at once that it was a diary, and the faded year on the cover told me it was fifty years old. Harry opened it eagerly. On the first page I could just make out the name "T. M. Riddle" in smudged ink.
"Hang on," said Ron, standing next to me, looking 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 d'you know that?" I said in amazement.
"Because Filch made me polish his shield about fifty times in detention," said Ron resentfully. "That was the one I burped slugs all over. If you'd wiped slime off a name for an hour, you'd remember it, too."
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Hermione left the hospital wing at the beginning of February. On her first evening back in Gryffindor Tower, Harry and I showed her T. M. Riddle's diary and told her the story of how we had found it. She was just as confused as Ron, Harry and I were.
I couldn't explain, even to myself, why I didn't just throw Riddle's diary away. The fact was that even though I knew the diary was blank, I kept absent-mindedly picking it up and turning the pages, as though it was a story I wanted to finish.
And while I was sure I had never heard the name T. M. Riddle before, it still seemed to mean something to me, almost as though Riddle was a friend I'd had when I was very small, and half-forgotten. But this was absurd. I'd never had friends before Hogwarts except for Harry.
The mood around Hogwarts was starting to go down and Lockhart's idea of a morale booster became clear at breakfast time on February the fourteenth. I hadn't had much sleep because of a late-running Quidditch practice the night before, so I hurried down to the Great Hall slightly late.
I thought, for a moment, that I'd walked through the wrong doors. The walls were all covered with large, lurid pink flowers. Worse still, heart-shaped confetti was falling from the pale blue ceiling.
I went over to the Gryffindor table, where Ron was sitting looking sickened, Harry who couldn't even bother to look up, and Hermione seemed to have come over rather giggly.
"What's going on?" I asked them, sitting down, and wiping confetti off my toast. Harry pointed to the teachers' table, apparently too disgusted to speak.
Lockhart, wearing lurid pink robes to match the decorations, was waving for silence.
"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 doors to the Entrance Hall marched a dozen surly-looking dwarfs.
Not just any dwarfs, however. Lockhart had them all wearing golden wings and carrying harps.
"My friendly, card-carrying cupids!" beamed Lockhart. "They will be roving around the school today delivering your Valentines! And the fun doesn't stop here!
I'm sure my colleagues will want to enter into the spirit of the occasion! Why not ask Professor Snape to show you how to whip up a Love Potion!"
Snape was looking as though the first person to ask him for a Love Potion would be force-fed poison.
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All day long, the dwarfs kept barging into my classes to deliver me my Valentines, to the annoyance of the teachers. So far, I had managed to avoid every card and dwarf that came my way, but late that afternoon, as the Gryffindors were walking upstairs for Charms, one of them caught up with me.
"Oy, you! Y/n Darlin'ton" shouted a particularly grim-looking dwarf, elbowing people out of the way to get to me. Hot all over at the thought of being given a Valentine, I tried to escape. The dwarf, however, cut his way through the crowd and reached me before I'd gone two paces.
"I've got a musical message to deliver to Y/n Darlin'ton in person," he said, twanging his harp in a threatening sort of way.
"Not here," I hissed, trying to escape.
"Stay still!" grunted the dwarf, grabbing hold of my bag and pulling me back.
"Let me go!" I snarled, tugging. With a loud ripping noise, my bag split in two. My books, wand, parchment and quill spilled onto the floor and my ink bottle smashed over the lot.
"What's going on here?" came the cold, drawling voice of Draco Malfoy. I started stuffing everything feverishly into my ripped bag, desperate to get away before Malfoy could hear the musical Valentine.
"What's all this commotion?" said another familiar voice, as Percy Weasley arrived. Losing my head, I tried to make a run for it, but the dwarf seized me around the knees and brought me crashing to the floor.
"Right," he said, sitting on my ankles, "here is your singing Valentine:
𝓗𝓮𝓻 𝓿𝓸𝓲𝓬𝓮 𝓲𝓼 𝓫𝓮𝓪𝓾𝓽𝓲𝓯𝓾𝓵 𝓵𝓲𝓴𝓮 𝓪 𝓼𝔀𝓮𝓮𝓽 𝓶𝓾𝓼𝓲𝓬𝓪𝓵 𝓬𝓱𝓸𝓻𝓭,
𝓗𝓸𝔀 𝓱𝓮𝓻𝓸𝓲𝓬 𝓼𝓱𝓮 𝔀𝓸𝓾𝓵𝓭 𝓵𝓸𝓸𝓴, 𝔀𝓲𝓮𝓵𝓭𝓲𝓷𝓰 𝓪 𝓼𝔀𝓸𝓻𝓭.
𝓢𝓱𝓮 𝓵𝓸𝓸𝓴𝓼 𝓵𝓲𝓴𝓮 𝓪 𝓻𝓪𝔂 𝓸𝓯 𝓼𝓾𝓷𝓼𝓱𝓲𝓷𝓮,
𝓢𝓱𝓮 𝓼𝓶𝓮𝓵𝓵𝓼 𝓸𝓯 𝓭𝓮𝓮𝓹 𝓬𝓱𝓮𝓻𝓻𝔂 𝓹𝓲𝓷𝓮,
𝓣𝓱𝓮 𝓱𝓮𝓻𝓸 𝔀𝓱𝓸 𝓬𝓸𝓷𝓺𝓾𝓮𝓻𝓮𝓭 𝓽𝓱𝓮 𝓬𝓱𝓮𝓼𝓼𝓫𝓸𝓪𝓻𝓭.
-Translation-
Her voice is beautiful like a sweet musical chord,
How heroic she would look, wielding a sword.
She looks like a ray of sunshine,
She smells of deep cherry pine,
The hero who conquered the chessboard.
Thank you."
I got up, my feet numb from the weight of the dwarf.
"Off you go, off you go, the bell rang five minutes ago, off to class, now," Percy said, shooing some of the younger students away. "And you, Malfoy." I, glancing over, saw Malfoy stoop and snatch up something.
Leering, he showed it to Crabbe and Goyle, and I realised that he'd got Riddle's diary.
"Give that back," I said quietly, not in the mood to strangle Draco.
"Wonder what Y/n's written in this?" said Malfoy, who obviously hadn't noticed the year on the cover, and thought he had my own diary.
"It's Darlington to you, jackass," I hissed. A hush fell over the onlookers. Ginny was staring from the diary to me, looking terrified.
"Hand it over, Malfoy," said Percy sternly.
"When I've had a look," said Malfoy, waving the diary tauntingly at me. Percy said,
"As a school Prefect –", but I had lost my temper. I pulled out my wand and shouted,
"Expelliarmus!" and just as Snape had disarmed Lockhart, so Malfoy found the diary shooting out of his hand into the air. Ron, grinning broadly, caught it.
"Y/n!" said Percy loudly. "No magic in the corridors. I'll have to report this, you know!"
But I didn't care, I'd got one over on Malfoy, and that was worth five points from Gryffindor any day. Malfoy was looking furious, and as Dean passed me to enter his classroom, Draco yelled spitefully after him,
"I don't think Y/n liked your Valentine much!" Dean covered his face with his hands and ran into class.
It wasn't until we had reached Professor Flitwick's class that I noticed something rather odd about Riddle's diary.
All my other books were drenched in scarlet ink. The diary, however, was as clean as it had been before the ink bottle had smashed all over it. I sat next to Harry on his four-poster and flicked through the blank pages, not one of which had a trace of scarlet ink on it.
Then I pulled a new bottle out of Harry's bedside cabinet, dipped my 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 vanished.
Excited, Harry loaded up his quill too and wrote,
"My name is Harry Potter." The words 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 ink, came words neither of us had never written.
"Hello, Harry Potter. My name is Tom Riddle." These words, too.
"Do you know anything about the Chamber of Secrets?" My heart was hammering. Riddle's reply came quickly, his writing becoming untidier, as though he was hurrying to tell all he knew.
"Yes,"
"Can you tell me?"
"Harry, can we trust him?" I asked,
"I dunno, but we won't know until he tells us,"
"No," Came the ink on the page. I groaned in frustration until new words appeared, "But I can show you,"
The pages of the diary began to blow as though caught in a high wind, stopping halfway through the month of June. We felt our bodies leave the bed and we were pitched headfirst through the opening in the page, into a whirl of colour and shadow.
I felt my feet hit solid ground, and stood, shaking, as the blurred shapes around me came suddenly into focus. Harry joined me, shortly after, just as dazed as me.
"Alright there, Y/n?" Harry asked, helping me to my feet,
"Yep," I grunted, "You?"
"Fine."
I knew immediately where I was. Dumbledore's office – but it wasn't Dumbledore who was sitting behind the desk. A frail-looking wizard was reading a letter.
"I'm sorry," I said shakily to the man, "We didn't mean to butt in ..." But the wizard didn't look up. He continued to read, frowning slightly. I drew nearer to his desk and stammered,
"Er – we'll just go, shall we?" Harry said. Still the wizard ignored us. He didn't seem even to have heard either of us. The wizard folded up the letter with a sigh, stood up, walked past Harry and me without glancing at us and went to draw the curtains at his window.
The sky outside the window was ruby red; it seemed to be sunset. The wizard went back to the desk, and sat down, watching the door.
Harry and I exchanged nervous looks. This was Hogwarts as Riddle had known it, meaning that this unknown wizard was Headmaster, not Dumbledore. There was a knock on the office door.
"Enter," said the old wizard in a feeble voice. A boy of about sixteen entered, taking off his pointed hat. A silver Prefect's badge was glinting on his chest. He was much taller than Harry and me, but he, too, had jet-black hair similar to Harry's.
"Ah, Riddle," said the Headmaster.
"You wanted to see me, Professor Dippet?" said Riddle. He looked nervous.
"Sit down," said Dippet. "I've just been reading the letter you sent me."
"Oh," said Riddle. He sat down, gripping his hands together very tightly.
"My dear boy," said Dippet kindly, "I cannot possibly let you two stay at school over the summer. Surely you two want to go home for the holidays?"
"No," said Riddle at once, "I'd much rather stay at Hogwarts, and I'm sure Y/n would rather stay as well than go back to that – to that –"
"You and Darlington live in a Muggle orphanage during the holidays, I believe?" said Dippet curiously.
"We do, yes, sir," said Riddle, reddening slightly.
"You are Muggle-born?"
"Half-blood, sir," said Riddle. "Muggle father, witch mother."
"And are both your parents –?"
"My mother died just after I was born, sir. They told me at the orphanage she lived just long enough to name me: Tom after my father, Marvolo after my grandfather." Dippet clucked his tongue sympathetically.
"And Miss Darlington?" Riddle gulped and fiddled with his fingers.
"We don't know sir. She was left at the orphanage doorstep as a baby, sir," he muttered.
"Has Miss Darlington ever attempted to figure out her ancestry?" Riddle gulped as though he was not very fond of the whole topic of her finding her family.
"Till recently, she was never interested about it. But lately- she has been spending a lot of time trying to figure out where she's from..."
"The thing is, Tom," he sighed, "special arrangements might have been made for you and her, but in the current circumstances ..."
"You mean all these attacks, sir?" said Riddle, and my heart leapt, and I moved closer, pulling Harry with me, scared of missing anything.
"Precisely," said the Headmaster. "My dear boy, you must see how foolish it would be of me to allow you two to remain at the castle when the term ends. Particularly in light of the recent tragedy ... the death of that poor little girl ...
I heard she was a good friend of Darlington ... You will be safer by far at your orphanage. As a matter of fact, the Ministry of Magic is even now talking about closing the school. We are no nearer locating the – er – source of all this unpleasantness ..." Riddle's eyes had widened.
"Sir – if the person was caught ... If it all stopped ..."
"What do you mean?" said Dippet, with a squeak in his voice, sitting up in his chair. "Riddle, do you mean you know something about these attacks?"
"No, sir," said Riddle quickly. Dippet sank back, looking faintly disappointed.
"You may go, Tom ..." Riddle slid off his chair and stumped out of the room. I followed him. Down the moving spiral staircase, we went, emerging next to the gargoyle in the darkening corridor.
Riddle stopped, and so did Harry and I, watching him. I could tell that Riddle was doing some serious thinking. He was biting his lip, his forehead furrowed. Then, as though he had suddenly reached a decision, he hurried off with Harry and me gliding noiselessly behind him.
It felt like almost ages when Riddle had finally arrived at a part of the castle Harry and I knew not of.
All that could be heard was the soft cry of a young girl. Huddled in the corner of the room with her knees to her chest was a young girl in Slytherin robes, crying silently.
"Y/n..." Said Riddle softly, approaching the young girl slowly.
Noticing his presence, the young girl looked up. I gasped at once, it was the same girl who I saw in McGonagal's picture book and the album book that Hagrid had given me the year prior! Without even realising that I couldn't be seen, I hid behind a pillar.
"Oh, Tom!" She said, her voice so miserable. I came out from the pillar. Riddle knelt down to face the girl and he held her face in his palms, wiping her tears off with his thumbs.
"Oh, don't cry, y/n... I hate it so much when I see tears on your face," Riddle said in a soft voice, kissing the woman's forehead as a way to give her comfort.
"Tom... I'm scared," she wept. Riddle had a look on his face that made him look like someone had stabbed his heart with an icicle.
"Don't be, dear, I'm here with you... No harm will ever come across you while I'm here... Not even Malfoy can do anything to you while I'm here..." he told the woman, reassuringly while he gently caressed her head, holding it close to his chest.
There was genuine affection and sincerity in his voice, but at the very end when he was mentioning 'Malfoy', there was an evident sneakiness in his voice, almost as if he was lying to her. Not about the part where he would protect her, but the part where he mentioned it would be Malfoy who's out to hurt her.
"A-Abraxas? Why- What do you mean?"
"They say he's the one who's controlling the monster, Y/n."
"But- Why!? Why would he do something like that!?"
"Some speculate that he's out to get you. This only further proves that it really was him who cursed that boy. Trust me." I wanted to see the woman's face, but it was impossible, she whimpered and buried her head into Riddle's chest, while he held her tightly, "You made a good decision breaking up with him."
"You think so?" The girl looked up at him, her eyes shining with purity and innocence. Not the idiotic kind of innocence, but the kind to be easily persuaded.
"I know so." Riddle said, giving the girl another kiss on her forehead, "Good girl." He added, quietly.
"They say the monster can kill easily, just by looking at someone... What if it- What if it kills me next?" The girl said, quietly.
"No!" Tom said very suddenly, "The monster would never kill you, or dare to even hurt as much as a hair on your body,"
"How do you know that?" The girl said miserably, "What if I am a muggle-born?"
"I just know, Y/n. I just do." Was all Riddle said,
"They say Hogwarts is closing,"
"Yes, I've heard..."
"Tom, I don't want to go back to the orphanage..." The girl said, her voice cracking, holding Riddle's hand tightly.
"I promise you, I will do anything to make you happy," Riddle assured.
He got up once again and began walking in another direction. I stayed and watched the girl, but Harry held my hand tightly and began pulling me in the direction Riddle was headed.
But to our disappointment, Riddle led us not into a hidden passageway or a secret tunnel but the very dungeon in which we had Potions with Snape. The torches hadn't been lit, and when Riddle pushed the door almost closed, I could only just see Riddle, standing stock-still by the door, watching the passage outside.
"C'mon ... gotta get yeh outta here ... c'mon now ... in the box ..." I could see the dark outline of a huge boy who was crouching in front of an open door, a very large box next to it.
"Evening, Rubeus," said Riddle sharply. The boy slammed the door shut and stood up, "I'm going to have to turn you in, Hagrid. I don't think you meant it to kill anyone –"
"No, yeh can't! Yeh don' understand!"
"Come on, Rubeus," said Riddle, moving yet closer. "Hagrid. The dead girl's parents will be here tomorrow. The least Hogwarts can do is make sure the thing that killed their daughter is slaughtered."
"It wasn' him!" roared the boy, his voice echoing in the dark passage. "Aragog never'd kill no one! Never!"
"Stand aside," said Riddle, drawing out his wand. A vast hairy body and a tangle of black legs; a gleam of many eyes and a pair of razor-sharp pincers – Riddle raised his wand again, but he was too late.
The thing bowled him over as it scuttled away.
"NOOOOOOO!" The scene whirled, the darkness became complete, I felt myself falling and, with a crash, I landed spread-eagled on Harry's fourposter in the Gryffindor dormitory next to Harry, Riddle's diary lying open on the bed in between us.
Before we had had time to regain our breath, the dormitory door opened and Ron came in.
"There you are," he said. Harry sat up and so did I. We were sweating and shaking.
"What's up?" said Ron, looking at us with concern.
"It was Hagrid, Ron. Hagrid opened the Chamber of Secrets fifty years ago."
"We don't even know this Riddle. He sounds like a dirty, rotten snitch to me" Said Ron the next morning, as we walked through the courtyard
"But the monster had killed someone, Ron, what would any of us have done?" said Harry.
"Harry has a point, y'know," I added, having conflicted feelings on this matter,
"See, even Y/n agrees with me," Harry argued, causing me to stop in my tracks.
"Wait, hold on now, I never said I agreed with you. I'm just saying you have a point." I said, Harry sighed in disappointment.
The four of us fell silent. After a long pause, Hermione voiced the knottiest question of all in a hesitant voice:
"Look. Hagrid's our friend. Why don't we just go ask him about it??"
"That'd be a cheerful visit," said Ron, in a mocking voice. "Hello, Hagrid, tell us, have you been setting anything mad and hairy loose in the castle lately?"
"Mad 'n hairy?" A sudden loud voice said, from behind us. Harry, Ron, Hermione, and I turned around at once in surprise, "Wouldn' be talkin' 'bou me, now would yeh?" We grinned at Hagrid, sheepishly with guilty expressions on our faces.
"No!" We said at once. Hagrid looked at us curiously. We gulped and looked around.
"What's that you've got, Hagrid?" Harry said, trying to diffuse the tension. Hagrid held up a large green canister.
"Flesh-Eatin' Slug Repellent. Fer the Mandrakes, yeh know. Accordin' ter Professor Sprout, they still got a bit o' growin' up ter do, but once their acne clears up, we'll be able to chop 'em up, stew 'em, an' get those people in the hospital un-Petrified.
'Til then, you four best watch yerselves, all righ'?" Hagrid said and we nodded, watching the larger man walk away. Shortly after he left, Neville came running towards us, clearly panicking.
"Harry, I don't know who did it, but... you'd better come." Neville lead the way back to Harry's room, and I understood why Neville was panicking. The contents of Harry's trunk had been thrown everywhere.
The whole room was in shambles- or at least Harry's part of it was.
I was examining Harry's robes. All the pockets were hanging out.
"Someone's been looking for something," I said. "Is there anything missing?" Harry started to pick up all his things and throw them into his trunk.
"Riddle's diary's gone," he said in an undertone to Ron and me.
"What?"
"But - only a Gryffindor could have stolen - nobody else knows our password ..."
"Exactly..." said Harry.
🌖🌗🌘🌑🌒🌓🌘
I woke the next day to brilliant sunshine and a light, refreshing breeze.
"Perfect Quidditch conditions!" said Wood enthusiastically, "Y/n, buck up there, you need a decent breakfast."
Hermione, however, clapped a hand to her forehead.
"Y/n - I think I've just understood a couple of things! I've got to go to the library!"
"What?"
"Remember those things you showed me last year that you got for Christmas? The locket!? That hanging charm!? And about the chamber!"
"What? What're you talking about?"
"I've just remembered! I've seen that symbol on that hanging charm before somewhere! It could be related to where I've seen it! And I think I've just found out why the locket won't open!" She said in a rushed voice.
"Wait, really!?"
"Y/n, call me crazy, but I think there's more to your past than what you might see..."
"But what do the locket and the charm have to do with the Chamber?"
"Absolutely nothing, but there's something mysterious about the locket and I think I might've figured it out-!" And she sprinted away, up the stairs.
"What does she understand?" I said, confused.
"Loads more than I do," said Ron, shaking his head.
"But why's she got to go to the library?" Harry asked,
"Because that's what Hermione does," said Ron, shrugging.
"When in doubt, go to the library," I said.
"You'd better get moving," said Ron. "It's nearly eleven - the match."
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A/n: Hermione knows something... hehehehe