The fog lifted and the observers found themselves in Moaning Myrtle's bathroom.
"Oh thank god, we skipped Christmas," Ron sighed completely forgetting that the Slytherins could here him.
"What happened on Christmas," Parkinson asked curiously.
Ron paled but was saved from answering by the memory starting.
Oh, it's you," she said when she saw Harry march in holding Lockhart at wandpoint. "What do you want this time?"
"To ask you how you died," said Harry.
Myrtle's whole aspect changed at once. She looked as though she had never been asked such a flattering question.
"Ooooh, it was dreadful," she said with relish. "It happened right in here. I died in this very stall. There was a boy in here speaking, so I unlocked the door, to tell him to go and use his own toilet, and then —" Myrtle swelled importantly, her face shining. "I died."
"How?" said Harry.
"No idea," said Myrtle in hushed tones. "I just remember seeing a pair of great, big, yellow eyes. My whole body sort of seized up, and then I was floating away..."
"Where exactly did you see the eyes?" said Harry.
"Somewhere there," said Myrtle, pointing vaguely toward the sink in front of her toilet.
Harry and Ron hurried over to it. Lockhart was standing well back, a look of utter terror on his face. It looked like an ordinary sink. They examined every inch of it, inside and out, including the pipes below. And then Harry saw it: Scratched on the side of one of the copper taps was a tiny snake.
"That tap's never worked," said Myrtle brightly as he tried to turn it.
"Harry," said Ron. "Say something. Something in Parseltongue."
"Open up," he said. Except that the words weren't what he heard; a strange hissing had escaped him, and at once the tap glowed with a brilliant white light and began to spin. Next second, the sink began to move; the sink sank leaving a large pipe exposed, a pipe wide enough for a man to slide into. Harry heard Ron gasp and looked up again. He had made up his mind what he was going to do.
"I'm going down there," he said.
"Me too," said Ron.
"Well, you hardly seem to need me," said Lockhart, with a shadow of his old smile. "I'll just —" He put his hand on the doorknob, but Ron and Harry both pointed their wands at him.
"You can go first," Ron snarled.
White-faced and wandless, Lockhart approached the opening. "Boys," he said, his voice feeble. "Boys, what good will it do?"
Harry jabbed him in the back with his wand. Lockhart slid his legs into the pipe.
"I really don't think —" he started to say, but Ron gave him a push, and he slid out of sight.
Harry followed quickly. He lowered himself slowly into the pipe, then let go.
It was like rushing down an endless, slimy, dark slide. He could see more pipes branching off in all directions, but none as large as theirs, which twisted and turned, sloping steeply downward. The pipe leveled out, and he shot out of the end with a wet thud, landing on the damp floor of a dark stone tunnel large enough to stand in. Lockhart was getting to his feet a little ways away, covered in slime and white as a ghost. Harry stood aside as Ron came whizzing out of the pipe, too.
"We must be miles under the school," said Harry, his voice echoing in the black tunnel.
"Under the lake, probably," said Ron, squinting around at the dark, slimy walls.
"Lumos!" Harry muttered to his wand and it lit again. "C'mon," he said to Ron and Lockhart, and off they went, their footsteps slapping loudly on the wet floor.
The tunnel was so dark that they could only see a little distance ahead. Their shadows on the wet walls looked monstrous in the wandlight.
"Remember," Harry said quietly as they walked cautiously forward, "any sign of movement, close your eyes right away..."
"Harry — there's something up there —" said Ron hoarsely, grabbing Harry's shoulder.
They froze, watching. Harry could just see the outline of something huge and curved, lying right across the tunnel. It wasn't moving.
"Maybe it's asleep," he breathed, glancing back at the other two. Lockhart's hands were pressed over his eyes. Harry turned back to look at the thing, his heart beating so fast it hurt.
Very slowly, his eyes as narrow as he could make them and still see, Harry edged forward, his wand held high. The light slid over a gigantic snakeskin, of a vivid, poisonous green, lying curled and empty across the tunnel floor. The creature that had shed it must have been twenty feet long at least.
"Blimey," both Memory Ron and the entire Weasley Clan said weakly.
There was a sudden movement behind them. Gilderoy Lockhart's knees had given way.
"Get up," said Ron sharply, pointing his wand at Lockhart.
Lockhart got to his feet and dived at Ron, knocking him to the ground. Harry jumped forward, but too late — Lockhart was straightening up, panting, Ron's wand in his hand and a gleaming smile back on his face.
"The adventure ends here, boys!" he said. "I shall take a bit of this skin back up to the school, tell them I was too late to save the girl, and that you two tragically lost your minds at the sight of her mangled body — say good-bye to your memories!"
He raised Ron's Spellotaped wand high over his head and yelled, "Obliviate!"
The wand exploded with the force of a small bomb. Harry flung his arms over his head and ran, slipping over the coils of snakeskin, out of the way of great chunks of tunnel ceiling that were thundering to the floor. Next moment, he was standing alone, gazing at a solid wall of broken rock.
"Ron!" he shouted. "Are you okay? Ron!"
"I'm here!" came Ron's muffled voice from behind the rockfall. "I'm okay — this git's not, though — he got blasted by the wand —"
There was a dull thud and a loud "ow!" It sounded as though Ron had just kicked Lockhart in the shins.
"That asshole. I was wondering what had happened to him," Cho said with obvious disgust in her voice.
"What now?" Ron's voice said, sounding desperate. "We can't get through — it'll take ages..."
Harry looked up at the tunnel ceiling. Huge cracks had appeared in it.
"Wait there," he called to Ron. "Wait with Lockhart. I'll go on...If I'm not back in an hour..."
There was a very pregnant pause, "I'll try and shift some of this rock," said Ron, who seemed to be trying to keep his voice steady. "So you can — can get back through. And, Harry —"
"See you in a bit," said Harry, trying to inject some confidence into his shaking voice.
And he set off alone past the giant snakeskin.
Soon the distant noise of Ron straining to shift the rocks was gone. The tunnel turned and turned again. And then, at last, as he crept around yet another bend, he saw a solid wall ahead on which two entwined serpents were carved, their eyes set with great, glinting emeralds. Harry approached, his throat very dry. He cleared his throat, and the emerald eyes seemed to flicker.
"Open," said Harry, in a low, faint hiss. The serpents parted as the wall cracked open, the halves slid smoothly out of sight, and Harry, shaking from head to foot, walked inside.
He pulled out his wand and moved forward between the serpentine columns. Every careful footstep echoed loudly off the shadowy walls. He kept his eyes narrowed, ready to clamp them shut at the smallest sign of movement. Then, as he drew level with the last pair of pillars, a statue high as the Chamber itself loomed into view, standing against the back wall. And between the feet, facedown, lay a small, black-robed figure with flaming-red hair.
"Ginny!" Harry muttered, sprinting to her and dropping to his knees. "Ginny — don't be dead — please don't be dead —"
He flung his wand aside, grabbed Ginny's shoulders, and turned her over. Her face was white as marble and as cold, yet her eyes were closed, so she wasn't Petrified.
"Why on Earth did you throw your wand," Hermione hissed.
"I wasn't thinking," Harry defended. "She looked dead and I freaked."
"Ginny, please wake up," Harry muttered desperately, shaking her. Ginny's head lolled hopelessly from side to side.
"She won't wake," said a soft voice.
Harry jumped and spun around on his knees. A tall, black-haired boy was leaning against the nearest pillar, watching. He was strangely blurred around the edges, as though Harry were looking at him through a misted window.
"Tom — Tom Riddle?"
Riddle nodded, not taking his eyes off Harry's face.
"What d'you mean, she won't wake?" Harry said desperately. "She's not — she's not —?"
"She's still alive," said Riddle. "But only just."
"Are you a ghost?" Harry said uncertainly.
"A memory," said Riddle quietly. "Preserved in a diary for fifty years."
He pointed toward the floor near the statue's giant toes. Lying open there was the little black diary Harry had found in Moaning Myrtle's bathroom. Harry, sweating, managed to hoist Ginny half off the floor and bent to pick up his wand again. But his wand had gone.
"Did you see —?"
He looked up. Riddle was still watching him — twirling Harry's wand between his long fingers.
"Thanks," said Harry, stretching out his hand for it.
A smile curled the corners of Riddle's mouth. He continued to stare at Harry, twirling the wand idly.
"Listen," said Harry urgently, his knees sagging with Ginny's dead weight. "We've got to go! If the basilisk comes —"
"It won't come until it is called," said Riddle calmly.
Harry lowered Ginny back onto the floor, unable to hold her up any longer.
"What d'you mean?" he said. "Look, give me my wand, I might need it —"
Riddle's smile broadened.
"You won't be needing it," he said.
Harry stared at him, and the observers held their breaths as they watched the interaction.
"What d'you mean, I won't be —?"
"I've waited a long time for this, Harry Potter," said Riddle. "For the chance to see you. To speak to you."
"Look," said Harry, losing patience, "I don't think you get it. We're in the Chamber of Secrets. We can talk later —"
"We're going to talk now," said Riddle, still smiling broadly, and he pocketed Harry's wand.
Harry stared at him. There was something very funny going on here...
"How did Ginny get like this?" he asked slowly.
"Well, that's an interesting question," said Riddle pleasantly. "And quite a long story. I suppose the real reason Ginny's like this is because she opened her heart and spilled all her secrets to an invisible stranger."
"What are you talking about?" said Harry.
"My diary," said Riddle. "Little Ginny's been writing in it for months, telling me all her pitiful worries and woes — how her brothers tease her, how she had to come to school with secondhand robes and books..."
Ginny's face heated up in rage and embarrassment.
All the time he spoke, Riddle's eyes never left Harry's face. There was an almost hungry look in them.
"Ginny poured out her soul to me, and her soul happened to be exactly what I wanted...I grew stronger on a diet of her deepest fears. I grew powerful, far more powerful than little Miss Weasley. Powerful enough to start feeding Miss Weasley a few of my secrets, to start pouring a little of my soul back into her..."
"What d'you mean?" said Harry, whose mouth had gone very dry.
"Haven't you guessed yet?" said Riddle softly. "Ginny Weasley opened the Chamber of Secrets. She strangled the school roosters and daubed threatening messages on the walls. She set the Serpent of Slytherin on four Mudbloods, and the Squib's cat."
"No," Harry whispered.
"Yes," said Riddle, calmly. "Of course, she didn't know what she was doing at first. It was very amusing."
Harry's fists were clenched, the nails digging deep into his palms.
"It took a very long time for stupid little Ginny to stop trusting her diary," said Riddle. "But when she finally became suspicious and tried to dispose of it, you found it. Of all the people who could have picked it up, it was you, the very person I was most anxious to meet..."
"And why did you want to meet me?" said Harry. Anger was coursing through him, and it was an effort to keep his voice steady.
"Well, you see, Ginny told me all about you, Harry," said Riddle. "Your whole fascinating history." His eyes roved over the lightning scar on Harry's forehead, and his expression grew hungrier. "I knew I must find out more about you, talk to you, meet you if I could. So I decided to show you my famous capture of that great oaf, Hagrid, to gain your trust —"
"Hagrid's my friend," said Harry, his voice now shaking. "And you framed him, didn't you? I thought you made a mistake, but —"
Riddle laughed his high laugh again.
"It was my word against Hagrid's, Harry. Well, you can imagine how it looked to old Armando Dippet. On the one hand, Tom Riddle, poor but brilliant, parentless but so brave, school prefect, model student...on the other hand, big, blundering Hagrid, in trouble every other week, trying to raise werewolf cubs under his bed, sneaking off to the Forbidden Forest to wrestle trolls."
"I bet Dumbledore saw right through you," said Harry, his teeth gritted.
"Well, he certainly kept an annoyingly close watch on me after Hagrid was expelled," said Riddle carelessly. "I knew it wouldn't be safe to open the Chamber again while I was still at school. I decided to leave behind a diary, preserving my sixteen-year-old self in its pages, so that one day, I would be able to lead another in my footsteps, and finish Salazar Slytherin's noble work."
"Well, you haven't finished it," said Harry triumphantly. "No one's died this time, not even the cat. In a few hours, everyone who was Petrified will be alright again —"
"Haven't I told you," said Riddle quietly, "that killing Mudbloods doesn't matter to me anymore? For many months now, my new target has been — you."
Harry stared at him.
"How is it that you — a skinny boy with no extraordinary magical talent — managed to defeat the greatest wizard of all time? How did you escape with nothing but a scar, while Lord Voldemort's powers were destroyed?"
There was an odd red gleam in his hungry eyes now.
"Why do you care how I escaped?" said Harry slowly. "Voldemort was after your time..."
"Voldemort," said Riddle softly, "is my past, present, and future..."
He pulled Harry's wand from his pocket and began to trace it through the air, writing three shimmering words:
TOM MARVOLO RIDDLE
Then he waved the wand once, and the letters of his name rearranged themselves:
I AM LORD VOLDEMORT
"You see?" he whispered. "You think I was going to use my filthy Muggle father's name forever? No, Harry — I fashioned myself a new name, a name I knew wizards everywhere would one day fear to speak, when I had become the greatest sorcerer in the world!"
"You're not," he said, his quiet voice full of hatred.
"Not what?" snapped Riddle.
"Not the greatest sorcerer in the world," said Harry, breathing fast.
Riddle opened his mouth, but froze; music was coming from somewhere. Riddle whirled around to stare down the empty Chamber. The music was growing louder, then flames erupted at the top of the nearest pillar. A crimson bird the size of a swan had appeared, it gleaming talons were gripping a ragged bundle. It dropped the ragged thing it was carrying at Harry's feet, then landed heavily on his shoulder.
"Fawkes?" Harry breathed, and he felt the bird's golden claws squeeze his shoulder gently.
"And that —" said Riddle, now eyeing the ragged thing that Fawkes had dropped, "that's the old school Sorting Hat —"
"This is what Dumbledore sends his defender! A songbird and an old hat! Do you feel brave, Potter?"
He cast an amused eye over Fawkes and the Sorting Hat, then walked away. Harry, fear spreading up his numb legs, watched Riddle stop between the high pillars and look up into the stone face of Slytherin, high above him in the half-darkness. Riddle opened his mouth wide and hissed, "Speak to me, Slytherin, greatest of the Hogwarts Four."
Horrorstruck, Harry saw his mouth opening, wider and wider, to make a huge black hole. And something was stirring inside the statue's mouth. Something huge hit the stone floor of the Chamber. Harry felt it shudder — he knew what was happening.
Then he heard Riddle's hissing voice:
"Kill him."
Eyes still tightly shut, Harry began to run blindly sideways. There was a loud, explosive spitting sound right above him, and then something heavy hit Harry so hard that he was smashed into the wall. He couldn't help it — he opened his eyes wide enough to squint at what was going on.
The enormous serpent had raised itself high in the air and its great blunt head was weaving drunkenly between the pillars. Fawkes was soaring around its head, and the basilisk was snapping furiously at him with fangs long and thin as sabers Fawkes dived. His long golden beak sank out of sight and a sudden shower of dark blood spattered the floor. The snake's tail thrashed, narrowly missing Harry, and before Harry could shut his eyes, it turned — Harry looked straight into its face and saw that its eyes had been punctured by the phoenix.
"NO!" Harry heard Riddle screaming. "LEAVE THE BIRD! THE BOY IS BEHIND YOU. YOU CAN STILL SMELL HIM. KILL HIM!"
The blinded serpent swayed, confused, still deadly. Fawkes was circling its head, piping his eerie song, jabbing here and there at its scaly nose as the blood poured from its ruined eyes.
The snake's tail whipped across the floor again. Harry ducked. Something soft hit his face. The basilisk had swept the Sorting Hat into Harry's arms. Harry seized it. He rammed it onto his head and threw himself flat onto the floor as the basilisk's tail swung over him again. The hat contracted, as though an invisible hand was squeezing it very tightly. Something very hard and heavy thudded onto the top of Harry's head, almost knocking him out. He grabbed the top of the hat to pull it off and a gleaming silver sword had appeared inside the hat.
The basilisk lunged blindly. Harry threw his whole weight behind the sword and drove it to the hilt into the roof of the serpent's mouth. As warm blood drenched Harry's arms, he felt a searing pain just above his elbow. One long, poisonous fang was sinking deeper and deeper into his arm as the basilisk keeled over sideways and fell.
He dropped the fang and watched his own blood soaking his robes, his vision went foggy. He felt Fawkes lay his beautiful head on the spot where the serpent's fang had pierced him. He could hear echoing footsteps and then a dark shadow moved in front of him.
"You're dead, Potter," said Riddle's voice above him. "Dead. Even Dumbledore's bird
knows it. Do you see what he's doing, Potter? He's crying. I'm going to sit here and watch you die. Take your time. I'm in no hurry."
Instead of going black, the Chamber came back into focus. Harry gave his head a little shake and there was Fawkes, still resting his head on Harry's arm. A pearly patch of tears was shining all around the wound — except that there was no wound.
"Phoenix tears..." said Riddle quietly, staring at Harry's arm. "Of course...healing powers...I forgot..."
He looked into Harry's face. "But it makes no difference. In fact, I prefer it this way. Just you and me."
He raised the wand, then, in a rush of wings, Fawkes had soared back overhead and dropped the diary in Harry's lap. For a split second, both Harry and Riddle stared at it. Then, without thinking, Harry seized the basilisk fang on the floor next to him and plunged it straight into the heart of the book.
There was a long, dreadful, piercing scream. Ink spurted out of the diary in torrents, streaming over Harry's hands, flooding the floor. Riddle was gone. Harry's wand fell to the floor with a clatter and there was silence. Silence except for the steady drip drip of ink still oozing from the diary. The basilisk venom had burned a sizzling hole right through it.
There was silence among the observers as well.
"Congratulations. You have made through round two of 'Voldemort Wants a Rematch'. Stay tuned for round three in which I lose," Harry muttered into the silence as the grey fog descended over them.