Chapter Eight: Disastrous Duelling
Harish awoke the next morning to bright sunlight streaming in through the windows and his arm was properly reboned, though very stiff. He sat up quickly and looked at the bed across from him. Dean had already left. The teen leaned back against his pillows.
The previous night, he and the other boy asked each other questions. Harish finally gathered that Dean had grown up in the Muggle world and didn't know who his father was. All he said was that his father had left when he was really little and had never been seen again. Harish, in turn, told him that he had never known who his mother was, but he grew up with his father. He did mention that he knew that his eyes were the same shape as hers, though. The two boys had finally drifted off to sleep around the time when the sun was just beginning to rise.
He figured that the boy had already woken and had been dismissed, when he saw the empty bed. Seeing that Harish was awake, Madam Pomfrey came bustling over with a breakfast tray and then began bending and stretching his arm and fingers.
"All in order," she said as he clumsily fed himself porridge let-handed. "When you're done eating, you may leave."
Harish nodded gratefully and slurped down the rest of his porridge as fast as possible. Then, he quickly got dressed and hurried off, eager to tell Fred and George what he had learned that night. He ran down to the dungeons and into the common room. There he saw the twins, Draco, Hermione, and Daphne waiting on him to return.
"How's your arm?" Daphne asked, faint pink streaked along her pale cheeks again.
"Fine," he said. "But that's not that important—" and he explained about the second attack. To his annoyance, none of them looked surprised.
"We know," the twins said together.
"I overheard Professor McGonagall telling Professor Flitwick all about it," Hermione admitted.
"Oh," he said before he promptly informed them of his meeting Rabastan Lestrange's son and the conversation he held with Dobby.
"So it was the diary that caused—"
"The Chamber to open before?"
Harish nodded. "That's my best guess anyway. And if the diary is what opened the Chamber before, then that is what must have opened it this time…I wonder what the monster could be."
"And how it's getting—"
"Around the school unnoticed."
"Maybe it can make itself invisible," Hermione said. "Or maybe it can disguise itself—pretend to be a suit of armour or something—I've read about Chameleon Ghouls—"
"You read too much, Hermione," Fred said with a yawn.
The news of Colin Creevey's attack spread through the entire school by Monday morning. The air was suddenly thick with rumour and suspicion. The first years were now moving in tightly knit groups, as though they were frightened they would be attacked if they ventured forth alone, and everywhere he turned, Harish saw people staring at him suspiciously.
Ginny, who sat next to Creevey in Potions, seemed distraught at the fact that someone that sat so near her in one of her classes had been attacked. Fred and George had taken to covering themselves in boils of feathers and jumping out from behind statues to try to cheer her up until Percy threatened to write Mrs. Weasley that they were giving her nightmares.
Also, hidden from the teachers, a popular trade of talismans, amulets, and other protective charms was sweeping the school. Neville had bought a large, horrible smelling green onion, a pointed purple crystal, and a rotting newt tail before the other Gryffindor boys could point out that he was pureblood, and therefore most likely not to be attacked.
In the first couple of weeks of December Professor McGonagall came around as usual, collecting names of those who were going to be staying over the holidays. With Slytherins monster running amok the castle, there were few people that had signed up this year.
Most likely because the diary still hadn't been found, Harish had been told not to come home for the holidays once again. Draco also had to stay at the castle as well, for his father was going to be busy through Christmas as well. So the two of them signed up to stay, causing the twins and Hermione to do so also.
A couple weeks after that, Harish and the twins were walking across the Great Hall when they saw a group of people gathered around the notice board, reading a piece of parchment which had just been hung up. Dean, who had been rather friendly to Harish ever since their stay in the Hospital Wing together, waved them over.
"They're starting a Dueling Club!" he informed him excitedly, pointing at the parchment. "First meeting tonight!"
"I wouldn't mind dueling lessons," a sandy haired boy who was standing beside him said. "They might come in handy these days…"
"What, you reckon Slytherin's monster can duel?" Ron asked.
"Maybe not the monster, but what about the heir himself?" Harish asked coolly.
Ron started and watched the older boy suspiciously.
Harish walked away with the twins, heading into dinner. "It could be useful," he said to them. "We should go."
So at eight o' clock that evening, they went back to the Great Hall along with Draco and Hermione. The long dining tables had disappeared and were replaced by a large golden stage that sat along one wall. The ceiling was velvety black, matching the sky above, and most of the school seemed to be packed beneath it. All of them were carrying their wands and looking excited.
"I wonder who will be teaching us," Hermione said as they edged into the chattering crowd. "Someone told me that Flitwick was a dueling champion when he was young—maybe it'll be him."
"As long as it is not—" Harish began, but he ended with a groan as Lockhart swept onto the stage in deep plum robes, accompanied by Professor Snape.
Lockhart waved an arm around for silence and called, "Gather round, gather round! Can everyone see me? Can you all hear me? Excellent! Now, Professor Dumbledore has granted me permission to start this little dueling club in the light of recent events. Let me introduce my assistant, Professor Snape!" Lockhart flashed a wide smile. "He tells me he know a tiny bit about defensive spells and has sportingly agreed to help me with a short demonstration before we begin. Now, don't you youngsters worry—you'll still have your Potions Master when I'm through with him!"
Snape's upper lip was curling. Lockhart didn't seem to notice, for he was still smiling like an idiot.
"How much do you want to bet that Snape kills Lockhart within five minutes?" Harish asked the twins quietly.
"Ten galleons," George whispered back. Every Slytherin nearby them grinned.
Lockhart and Snape turned to face each other and bowed; at least, Lockhart did, with much flourishing of his hands. Snape's bow was more of an irritable jerk of his head. Then they raised their wands like swords in front of them.
"As you see, we are holding our wands in the accepted defensive combat position," Lockhart told the now silent crowd. "On the count of three, we will cast our first spells. Neither of us will be aiming to kill, of course."
"I would not bet on that," Draco said as Snape bared his teeth, earning them more snickers.
"One—two—three—"
Both of them raised their wands above their heads and pointed them at their opponent.
"Wait for it…" Harish whispered.
"Expelliarmus!" Snape cried. The spell was so strong that it left a sparkling red spell trail. It flew straight at Lockhart and he was thrown off his feet, into the wall, and he slid down it onto the floor.
All of the Slytherins in their area cheered.
"Thank you," George said as Harish handed him ten galleons with a sour look on his face. The whole Dueling Club would most likely be a complete waste of time, but Harish thought it was worth it just to see Lockhart publicly humiliated. He was getting unsteadily to his feet. His hat had fallen off and his hair was standing on end.
"Do you think he's all right?" Hermione asked.
"Who cares?" Harish and Draco answered together. Apparently twin-speak was contagious.
"Well there you have it!" he said, tottering back up on the stage. "That was a Disarming Charm—as you see, I've lost my wand—an, thank you Miss Brown—yes, an excellent idea to show them that, Professor Snape, but if you don't mind me saying so, it was pretty obvious that you were about to cast it. If I had wanted to stop you, it would've been too easy—however, I felt it would have been instructive to let them see…"
Snape was looking murderous. Perhaps Lockhart had finally noticed, for he said, "Enough demonstrating! I'm going to come amongst you now and put you all into pairs. Professor Snape, if you'd like to help me—"
They moved through the crowd, matching up partners. Lockhart paired Neville with Justin Finch-Fletchley, but Snape reached Ron first, pairing him with Draco. Harish couldn't quite tell which boy was more annoyed at this. Hermione was paired with Millicent Bulstrode, and Daphne was paired against Pansy Parkinson. Then Snape reached Harish with a nasty smile. Ever since Halloween, he had been trying to catch Harish off his guard and get him to do something to show that he may be Slytherin's heir.
"McLaggen!" he said. A burly Gryffindor came over. He had always been one of the Gryffindors that openly disdained Slytherins. "I want you to work with Mr. Blake."
Harish and McLaggen eyed each other with contempt.
"Face your partners!" Lockhart called, on the platform again. "And bow!"
Harish and McLaggen barely declined their heads.
"Wands at the ready!" Lockhart shouted. "When I count to three, cast your charms to disarm your opponents—only to disarm them—we don't want any accidents—one…two…three—"
Harish, who had already started on his spell at "two", pointed his wand at his opponent and McLaggen staggered backwards.
Wasting no time, McLaggen shouted, "Rictusempra!"
A jet of silver light came flying at the Slytherin, but he easily deflected it.
"I said disarm only!" Lockhart shouted in alarm over the heads of the battling crowd.
Harish cast a Tickling Charm so strong on McLaggen, that he fell to his knees, hardly able to breathe for he was laughing so hard. Harish paused for a moment and then called, "Tantellegra!"
McLaggen shot upright and his legs began spinning all around him in some sort of jig.
"Stop! Stop!" Lockhart screamed, but Snape took charge.
"Finite Incantatem!" he shouted; McLaggen's feet stopped spinning and both boys looked up at the professor.
A haze of greenish smoke surrounded the centre of the room. Both Neville and Justin were lying on the floor, panting; Ron was in a full body bind with Draco standing over him; and Hermione and Millicent were facing each other, Millicent's wand had shot somewhere off into the distance. Nearby the twins had been holding a friendly battle, Daphne had stunned Pansy, and Dean was holding off his own opponent.
"Dear, dear," Lockhart said, skittering through the crowd, looking at the aftermath of everyone's duels. "Up you go, Macmillan…Careful there, Miss Fawcett…Pinch it hard, it'll stop bleeding in a second, Boot." He paused a moment before saying, "I think I'd better teach you how to block unfriendly spells," Lockhart said, standing flustered in the middle of the hall. He glanced at Snape, whose eyes were glinting, and looked away quickly. "Let's have a volunteer pair—Longbottom and Finch-Fletchley, how about you—"
"A bad idea, Professor Lockhart," Snape intervened. "Longbottom causes devastation with the simplest of spells. We would be sending Finch-Fletchley to the hospital in a match box." Neville's face turned pink. "How about—Vaisey and Blake?"
The boy Harish recognized as the one that had confronted him and ended up in the Hospital Wing two years ago walked up. He should be a seventh year now. He looked at Snape who still had that nasty smile.
"Excellent idea!" Lockhart exclaimed, gesturing Harish and Vaisey into the middle of the hall as the crowd backed away to give them room.
Vaisey looked slightly nervous, but Snape leaned over and whispered something in his ear that caused him to regain his cool.
"Now, Harish," Lockhart said to him. "When Vaisey points his wand at you, you do this."
His raised his own wand, attempted a complicated wiggle action, and dropped it.
"You mean this?" Harish asked, silently casting a Shield Charm.
Lockhart looked flustered from being beaten by a fourth-year performing wordless magic. "Yes, that's what I meant. My wand is a little over excited."
Harish smirked. "Whatever you say," he muttered under his breath.
But Lockhart didn't hear. "Three—two—one—go!" he shouted.
Vaisey raised his wand quickly and bellowed, "Serpensortia!"
The end of his wand exploded and a long black snake shot out of it. There were screams as the crowd backed away quickly, clearing the floor.
"Don't move, Blake," Snape said lazily. "I'll get rid of it…"
"Allow me!" Lockhart shouted. His wand let off a bang and the snake went flying into the air. It landed back onto the floor with a thud. Enraged, it shot at Harish.
Not thinking as the snake reared to strike his face, he cried, "Stop!"
The snake froze, along with everyone else in the hall. He looked around and realized he had spoken in parseltongue. The snake swung its head around, finally stopping to look at Finch-Fletchley. The boy stepped back and paled. He looked at Harish with a terrified expression. Snape was looking at the fourth-year with a look of triumph.
Gotten over his shock, he backed out of the hall and his gang followed him.
"You never told me you were a parselmouth!" Daphne exclaimed once they had gotten back to the common room. She and Hermione were the only ones who were surprised by this turn of events.
Harish ran a hand through the back of his hair nervously. Now everyone in the school would know he was the heir.
"It might have slipped my mind," he replied.
The next morning snow lay over the grounds so thick that Care of Magical Creatures had been cancelled. With nothing better to do, he decided to go to the library and do some more research on the Chamber. When he reached the back of the library, he heard a heated conversation coming from a group of Hufflepuffs.
"So anyway, I told Justin to hide up in our dormitory," a stout boy was saying. Harish figured that Justin was the boy the snake had looked at before he left. "I mean to say, if Blake's marked him as his next victim, it's best if he keeps a low profile for a while. Of course, Justin's been waiting for something like this to happen ever since he let slip that he was a Muggle-born. He said he saw Blake pass them after he said so, apparently he had Care of Magical Creatures. That's not the kind of thing you blab about in the middle of a field with Slytherin's heir on the loose is it?"
"You definitely think it was Blake then, Ernie?" a girl with blonde pigtails asked.
"Hannah," the Ernie kid said solemnly. "He's a parselmouth. Everyone knows that that's the mark of a dark wizard. Have you ever heard of a decent one? They even called Slytherin himself Serpent-Tongue." There was a lot of murmuring at this. Ernie went on, "Remember what was written on the wall? Enemies of the Heir Beware? Blake had some sort of run-in with Filch, next thing we know his cats been petrified. That first year, Creevey, was annoying him at the Quidditch match, taking pictures of his arm. Next thing we know—Creevey's been attacked—"
Harish had had enough. But before he could step out and give them a piece of his mind, a dark boy emerged from a different set of shelves. Apparently he had been listening too.
"I'll have you know that Harish couldn't have petrified Colin Creevey," Dean said. "He was in the infirmary asleep. I should know, he was in the bed across from me."
"You're sticking up for him?" Ernie asked, puffing up angrily. "Even after he shoved you off your broom?"
"He was in pain! His arm had just been broken!"
"How do you know he isn't the heir?" Ernie asked. "He could've had an accomplice."
"I just do," Dean replied. "I can feel that he didn't petrify anyone."
"You can feel it? What sort of excuse is that? You know what I think? I think that you're working with him!"
Harish finally emerged from the shelves and all of the Hufflepuffs cowered. Dean looked surprised and slightly embarrassed at being caught defending him.
"Hello," he said as coldly as possible. "I'm looking for Justin Finch-Fletchley."
"Wh-wha-what do you want with him?"
Harish tried not to grin. They all looked too comical.
"None of your business," he said, sticking his nose in the air. He shot a wink in Dean's direction to let him know he was pulling their legs.
"I'll have you know that you can trace my family back through generations of witches and warlocks and my blood's as pure as anyone's so—"
"I don't care about your blood," he snarled, finally dropping his act. "Didn't you notice that snake was coming at me?"
"And then you sent it after Justin."
"It looked at Justin. It didn't even move toward him!"
And he turned on his heel and walked straight out of the library. He vaguely noticed that Dean was following him. Harish wasn't concentrating on where he was going, but more of who the imposter could be. Because of that, he walked straight into something big and hairy, then getting hit as Dean walked into him.
"Why aren't yeh two in class?" Hagrid, the giant gamekeeper, asked.
"Cancelled," both boys replied.
"The greenhouses were snowed in. What're you doing here?" Dean asked.
The giant held up a limp rooster.
"Second one killed this term," he said.
Harish was suddenly interested. This couldn't be a coincidence.
"Do you know what killed them?" he asked suddenly.
Hagrid looked down at him. "Don' I chase yeh away ferm the forest all the time?"
"Answer my question!" Harish said angrily. Hagrid looked taken aback.
"I think it's either foxes or a Blood-Suckin' Bugbear, an' I need the headmaster's permission ter put a charm around the—"
But Harish started off again, determined to reach the Slytherin common room to inform the others. Dean apologized quickly before running after Harish.
"What's going on?" he asked, catching up with the other boy.
"Go away," Harish snapped. "You can't follow me into my common room."
"But I stood up for you back there!" he called. Harish came to a halt. He turned to look at Dean, who was thinking fast. "This is the second time you haven't told me and I know you know what's going on! If you don't tell me, I'll go back and tell those Hufflepuffs that I just remembered that I had fallen asleep around the time of the attack."
Harish, instead of growing angry, actually smiled. "You really should be in Slytherin," he said to the boy earning a grin.
"So…?" Dean prompted him.
"All right," Harish sighed. "I'll tell you, but not here. Meet me outside the Slytherin common room tonight at midnight. And take this." He tossed the boy his Invisibility Cloak. "That will keep you from getting caught."
The two of them walked up a set of stairs and turned into another corridor, which was dark. The torches had been extinguished by the strong, icy draft the was blowing through a loos windowpane. They were halfway down the passage when Dean tripped over something. Harish helped him up and nudged what he tripped over with his foot.
"What is this?" he asked. The sun came from behind the clouds enough to light the corridor slightly.
Both boys gasped when they found themselves looking down into the staring face of Justin Finch-Fletchley. Just beyond him was the Gryffindor ghost, floating horizontally with his head hanging off his neck. He was no longer pearly and white, but was black and smoky. Both of them wore an identical shocked expression.
Harish looked wildly up and down the corridors for clues. Whatever the monster was, it left no trace. The only clue were spiders scuttling through the open window pane. As Harish puzzled over this, Dean stepped forward, looking at the ghost.
"Nick?" he asked. He turned to Harish looking confused. "What's powerful enough to petrify a ghost?"
Harish shrugged.
There was a bang and a door to their right burst open. Peeves, the poltergeist, came floating through, spinning in circles.
"What's Blake up to? Why's he lurking—" he cut off midcircle as he caught sight of Justin. He flipped right way up, filled his lungs, and screamed, "ATTACK! ATAA—"
Harish cast a spell that made him fall silent. Peeves clutched at his throat and zoomed away.
"Run!" he shouted and he and Dean ran as fast as they could away from the scene of the crime. Harish knew one thing for certain—he was done with being caught at the wrong place in the wrong time.
They heard repeated crashes as doors slammed open. Panting, they finally came to a halt when they could no longer hear what was going on in the corridor.
"That was a close one," Dean panted.
Harish nodded and gulped some air down. "I'll see you tonight," he said, before heading off to inform the others what happened.