"Oh no, look what you've done, left me the victim of a hit and run" ~ Return The Favour, All Time Low
"I have good news," McGonagall says, three says before the exams we're still being forced to so, despite the circumstances.
"You've caught the Heir of Slytherin!" A girl squeals from the Ravenclaw table.
"You've found Haylee Potter and Asher Saunters?" A Hufflepuff yells.
Tay and I share a sad look, and I squeeze her hand. She's the only other person right now that understands.
"Quidditch matches are back on!" Oliver roars excitedly.
"Professor Sprout has informed me that the Mandrakes are ready for cutting at last. Tonight, we will be able to revive all those people who have been Petrified. I need hardly remind you all that one of them may well be able to tell us who, or what attacked them, and where Mr. Saunters and Miss Potter are -" she pauses and looks sympathetically at Tay and I, before continuing. "- I am hopeful that this dreadful year will end with our catching the culprit."
There is an explosion of cheering, and Ron looks happier than I've seen him in weeks.
"It won't matter that we never asked Myrtle, then!" He says. "Hermione'll probably have the answers when they wake her up! Mind you, she'll go mad when she finds out we've got exams in three days' time. She hasn't revised. It might be kinder to leave her where she is till they're over."
Just now, Ginny comes over and sits beside Ron. She looks tense and nervous, and I can see that her hands are twisted it her lap.
"What's up?" Ron asks her.
She doesn't say anything, instead she just glances up and down the table with a scared look on her face. It reminds me of someone, but I can't put my finger on it.
"What is it, Ginny?" Tay asks. "Is it Asher? Because I'm sure he's fine."
Dobby. She reminds me of Dobby.
She's rocking back and forth slightly in her chair, exactly like Dobby did when he was on the edge of telling Haylee and I serious information.
"I've got to tell you something," Ginny mumbles, carefully avoiding looking at me.
"What is it?" I ask her.
She opens her mouth, but she seems like she can't find the words.
"What?" Ron questions.
"Is it something about the Chamber of Secrets?" I ask her, quietly so only the four of us can hear it. "Have you seen something? Someone acting oddly?"
Ginny takes a deep breath and opens her mouth to speak, but at that precise moment, Percy appears, looking tired.
"If you've finished eating, I'll take that seat, Ginny. I'm starving, I've only just come off patrol duty."
Ginny jumps up, as if the chair was just electrified, gives Percy a fleeting, frightened look and hurries away. Percy simply sits down casually.
"Percy!" Ron says angrily. "She was just about to tell us something important!"
Halfway through a gulp of tea, Percy choke.
"What sort of thing?" He coughs.
"I just asked her if she's seen anything odd, and she started to say -"
"Oh - that - that's nothing to so with the Chamber of Secrets," he says at once.
"How do you know?" Tay asks, raising her eyebrows.
"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 -"
"What were you doing, Percy?" Ron grins. "Go on, tell us, we won't laugh."
"Pass me those rolls, Taylor, I'm starving."
*~*
"Mark my words," Lockhart says, as he ushers Tay, Ron and I through the corridors to our next lesson. "The first words out of those poor Petrified people's mouths will be 'it was Hagrid' and when we find your sister and your brother, they'll say the same. Frankly, I'm astounded Professor McGonagall thinks all these security measures are necessary."
"I agree, sir," I say, devising a plan inside my head.
"Thank you, Harry," Lockhart says graciously. "I mean, we teachers have quiet enough to be getting on with, without walking students to classes and standing guard all night..."
"That's right, it's really rather unfair on you professors," Tay says, catching on.
"Why don't you leave us here, sir, we've only got one more corridor to go," Ron suggests.
"You know, Weasley, I think I will," Lockhart says. "I really should go and prepare my next class."
With that, he hurries away.
"Prepare his class," Tay sneers. "More like curl his hair."
We evade the other students around us and slip through a side passage towards Moaning Myrtle's bathroom.
"Potter? Weasley? Saunters? What are you doing?"
We turn to see McGonagall standing there, her mouth a thin line.
"We were - we were -" Ron stammers. "We were going to - to go and see -"
"Hermione," Tay and I say in unison.
"We haven't seen her in ages, Professor," I elaborate. "And we thought we'd sneak into the hospital wing, you know, and tell her about Haylee and Asher, and that the Mandrakes are nearly ready and, er, not to worry."
"Of course," she says in a croaky voice, tears glistening in her eyes. "Of course, I realise this has been hardest on the friends of those who have been...and Miss Potter and Mr. Saunters, I understand that must be very hard for you...I quite understand. Yes, Potter, of course you may visit Miss Granger. I will inform Professor Binns where you've fone. Tell Madam Pomfret I have give my permission."
The three of us walked away, with no other choice now but to visit Hermione.
"That," Ron says. "Was the best story you've ever come up with."
We reach the infirmary, and Madam Pomfrey reluctantly let's us inside.
"There's just no point talking to a Petrified person," she says as we take our seats beside Hermione's bed.
"Do you think she manages to see the attacker?" Tay asks, looking at Hermione's rigid face. "What if he snuck up on them, then we'll never know..."
Suddenly, I notice something odd about Hermione's right hand. A piece of paper is crunched on the inside of her clenched fist.
Making sure Madam Pomfrey isn't near, I begin trying to get the paper out, while Ron and Tay keep watch.
After several tense moments, the paper Coles free, and I smooth it out I order to examine it.
"It's a page torn from a library book," Tay murmurs, as I read the passage;
Of the many fearsome beasts and monsters that roam our land, there is none more serious or deadly that the Basilisk, known also as the King of Serpents. This snake, which may reach gigantic size, and live many hundreds of years, is born from a chicken's egg, hatched beneath a toad. It's methods of killing are most wondrous, for aside from it's deadly and venomous fangs, the Basilisk has a murderous stare, and all who are fixed with the beam of it's eye shall suffer instant dearh. Spiders flee before the Basilisk, for it is their mortal enemy.
And beneath that, a single word is written, in Hermione's handwriting.
Pipes.
It feels as if someone as has suddenly switched a light on inside my brain.
"Ron, Tay," I breath. "This is it. This is the answer. The monster in the Chamber's a Basilisk - a giant serpent! That's why Haylee and I been hearing that voice all over the place, and nobody else has heard it. It's because we understand Parseltongue..."
I look up and glance around at the Petrified people.
"The Basilisk kills people by looking at them. But no one's died - because no one looked it straight in the eye. Colin saw it through his camera. The Basilisk burned up all the film inside it, but Colin got Pettified. Justin...Justin must've seen the Basilisk through Nearly Headless Nick! Nick got the full blast of it, but he couldn't die again...and Hermione and that Ravenclaw prefect were found with a mirror next to them. Hermione has just realised that the monster was a Basilisk. I bet you anything she warned the first person she met to look round corners with a mirror first! And that girl pulled out her mirror - and - " I stop for a breath.
"And Mrs Norris?" Ron whispers eagerly,
I think back to he scene that night, and yet again, realisation hits me like a bus.
"The water..." I say slowly, "the flood from Moaning Myrtle's bathroom. I bet you Mrs Norris only saw the reflection..."
"Spiders flee before it!" Tay says suddenly. "It all fits!"
"But how's the Basilisk been getting around the place?" Ron asks. "A great dirty face...Someone would've seen..."
"Pipes," I say. "Pipes...it's been using the plumbing. We've been hearing that voice inside the walls..."
Ron suddenly grabs my arm, his face alight.
"The entrance to the Chamber of Secrets!" He says hoarsely. "What if it's a bathroom? What if it's in -"
" - Moaning Myrtle's bathroom!" Tay exclaims.
__________________________________________
Okay this book is almost over and things are getting serious!
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