The Fire You Touch

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Chapter 30: Crystal Ball

Harry, Ron, and Aeryn had tried to visit Hermione, but visitors were now barred from the hospital wing.

"WeÂ’re taking no more chances," Madam Pomfrey told them severely through a crack in the infirmary door. "No, IÂ’m sorry, thereÂ’s every chance the attacker might come back to finish these people off."

With Dumbledore gone, fear had spread as never before, so that the sun warming the castle walls outside seemed to stop at the mullioned windows. There was barely a face to be seen in the school that didnÂ’t look worried and tense, and any laughter that rang through the corridors sounded shrill and unnatural and was quickly stifled.

Now Aeryn had to watch her step even more carefully since the headmaster was no longer able to help her. The tension in the school allowed no sympathy for those who were different. It was pureblood against common-born, one side or the other, and each student regarded the others in underlying fear, searching for the slightest difference, something that would mark that person as the Heir of Slytherin. Aeryn had no doubt that if her secret was disclosed, she would be given—no pun intended—a veritable witch-trial.

The news from the Daily Prophet did nothing to calm her fear. Nearly every day, the paper screamed the terrifying news from the Muggle and wizarding worlds alike. Attacks from rogue mutants, bent on destruction of the ‘less advanced species’ and furious about the restrictions placed upon them, were a very real and present danger. Angry letters burned on the editorial page, passionately extolling the need for mutant registration and anti-mutant collars, like those that had been made legal in the United States—and England—and France—and—

But it wasn’t even so much her mutation, the attacker, or the Chamber of Secrets that worried Aeryn, though she maintained the façade that the latter two threats were the cause of her anxiety to keep others from becoming suspicious. It was the thought of the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher that woke her up in the middle of the night, gasping for breath and a cold sweat running down her back. He terrified her, especially now with Dumbledore gone. Fortunately, thanks to Professor McGonagall’s ultimatum that no student could wander Hogwarts alone, she had been able to avoid him as best she could.

The ultimatum, however, was not enough to keep LockhartÂ’s leering eyes off of her. She could always feel him watching, his forget-me-not blue eyes burning across her form when she walked to the board to write sentences or bent over her parchment to scribble notes. Even in the hallways, when she traveled with the pride of Gryffindors from class to class, he would grin knowingly at her as they crossed paths, sending cold shudders down her spine.

One afternoon he escorted the class to Potions, and she was the last to enter the classroom. Aeryn stepped quickly into the dungeon, but not before his hand slithered down her back and snapped her bra. She was trembling so violently when she got to her desk that when she sat down, she almost missed the chair.

She could have told Snape her worries, of course, but in the days following the departure of Dumbledore, the Potions master had become increasingly unapproachable. With DumbledoreÂ’s disappearance, AerynÂ’s hold on their bargain had disappeared. There was no headmaster for her to run to, for she had no idea how Professor McGonagall would react to her disclosure, and thus the Potions master had no need to worry.

Snape realized this too, she was certain of it. He had taken to strutting around the dungeons with an ever-present smirk that made Aeryn sick to her stomach, especially after he harangued Neville Longbottom for omitting snakeskin in his Sneeze-Inducing Potion and reduced the second year to tears.

His Slytherins were no less smug, and Draco Malfoy was the worst of them all. He paraded around the school as though he had just been appointed Head Boy. Aeryn didnÂ’t realize what he was so pleased about until the Potions lesson about two weeks after Dumbledore and Hagrid had left, when, sitting right behind Malfoy, Aeryn overheard him gloating to Crabbe and Goyle.

"I always thought Father might be the one who got rid of Dumbledore," he said, not troubling to keep his voice down. "I told you he thinks DumbledoreÂ’s the worst headmaster the schoolÂ’s ever had. Maybe weÂ’ll get a decent headmaster now. Someone who wonÂ’t want the Chamber of Secrets closed. McGonagall wonÂ’t last long, sheÂ’s only filling inÂ…"

Snape swept past Aeryn in a swirl of black robes, making no comment about HermioneÂ’s empty seat and cauldron.

DonÂ’t let him get to you,

she told herself, puffing out her cheeks and running a hand through her hair. The small of her back ached. The bell would ring at any second, and she could leave, wouldnÂ’t have to deal with Malfoy or Snape until tomorrowÂ…

"Sir," said Malfoy loudly. "Sir, why donÂ’t you apply for the headmasterÂ’s job?"

"Now, now, Malfoy," said Snape in his disinterested professorial way that was dampened only by the small glint in his coal-black eyes. A thin-lipped smile twitched his lips. "Professor Dumbledore has only been suspended by the governors. I daresay heÂ’ll be back with us soon enough."

"Yeah, right," said Malfoy, smirking. "I expect you’d have Father’s vote, sir, if you wanted to apply for the job—I’ll tell Father you’re the best teacher here, sir—"

The muscles in AerynÂ’s back were taut as she flung a handful of toadstools into her cauldron. She could still see Hermione, lying glassy-eyed and unmoving on her hospital bed, and she had to bite her lip hard to keep her vision clear.

Snape smirked as he swept off around the dungeon, fortunately not spotting Seamus Finnigan, who was pretending to vomit into his cauldron. Aeryn gritted her teeth and stirred her concoction.

DonÂ’t let him get to you.

"I’m quite surprised the Mudbloods haven’t all packed their bags by now," Malfoy went on. "Bet you five Galleons the next one dies. Pity it wasn’t Granger—"

A red miasma swiftly swam before AerynÂ’s eyes, and before anyone could stop her, she leapt upon Malfoy, pummeling him as hard as she could with her fists. The entire class erupted into chaos. Strong hands roughly grabbed her shoulders and, with difficulty, pulled her away from the second year, whose shocked face had gone as pale as paper.

"How dare you, you little bastard!" Aeryn shrieked, straining against the hands holding her back. She noticed, with some satisfaction, that blood was pouring from Malfoy’s nose. "‘Pity it wasn’t Granger,’ you motherfucker, say that within my hearing again, and I’ll make certain you’re the next one lying in the hospital wing, and it’ll take more than Mandrakes to mend your ass together again once I’m through with you!" Curling her lip, she spat at Malfoy’s feet. "Bigoted—pampered—pureblood monster!"

Malfoy put a trembling hand to his nose. "My father—"

"My father,"

Aeryn simpered mockingly. "Your father can kiss my ass—the whole Malfoy clan can kiss my ass—"

"Miss Blake!"

The Potions master stepped in front of her. Aeryn could feel the collective shrinking away of the class as he fixed a glare on her cold enough to freeze lava. "What," he growled, towering over her like a malevolent hawk, "what, Miss Blake, is the meaning of this?"

"Sir—" Malfoy whimpered from the floor "—she attacked me—it wasn’t my fault—"

"The hell it wasnÂ’t your fault!" Aeryn snapped.

"Miss Blake, that is enough," Snape said in a cold, clipped voice.

"Oh, don’t even start with me, Professor!" Aeryn snarled at him. "I am so sick of your meddling in everything!" A blistering rage pounded through her veins—she could see Malfoy cradling his streaming nose in his hands, Crabbe and Goyle standing guard over him—

"That is enough, Miss Blake," Snape repeated, a hardness beginning to edge his words. He nodded curtly, and the hands holding Aeryn’s arms reluctantly released her. "Ten points from Gryffindor—and you will apologize to Malfoy immediately."

MalfoyÂ’s head jerked up. "Only ten?" he asked, sounding as if a loyal friend had just betrayed him.

"Yeah, Professor, only ten?" Aeryn asked. She crossed her arms and glared up at him. A bitter, vengeful smile twitched the edge of her mouth. "Rather generous of you, considering how I rack up the points—oh, seventy at a time—"

SnapeÂ’s face went instantly white. "One more word out of you," he muttered between clenched teeth, "and youÂ’ll be in the HeadmasterÂ’s office before you can blink."

Aeryn laughed, tossing her head angrily. "Why don’t you just expel me?" she jeered. "That’d solve all your problems in a heartbeat—no Dumbledore, no Ministry—"

"THAT IS ENOUGH!" the Potions master roared in a voice so terrible that AerynÂ’s breath stopped in her throat.

The classroom was so still the dust could almost be heard gathering in the corners.

When the Potions master finally spoke again, it was in a whisper that sent shudders up and down AerynÂ’s spine.

"Miss Blake." With what appeared to be great effort, he straightened and took a step away from her. "You will stay in this classroom until I have escorted the rest of the students to Herbology. Then I shall deal with you."

The rest of the students rushed to their desks to gather their things, their actions jerky and devoid of their usual chatter.

"What about the attacker?" Aeryn couldnÂ’t resist saying, her voice dripping with sarcasm.

Snape whirled around on his heel, black fire flashing from his eyes. "If the attacker comes for you, Miss Blake," he snarled, "I wish him every success!" With that, he swept from the dungeon, the Gryffindors and Slytherins following hurriedly behind him, their faces pale and pinched.

Aeryn slowly sat down at an empty desk, her heart pounding loudly in her chest. The silence pressed heavily upon her. She swallowed hard and glanced around the dungeon, trying not to shudder at the sight of the pickled animals bobbing in their bottles. In the lifeless void of the Potions dungeon, Aeryn began to realize just how childishly she had acted.

But she did not have long to reflect on her actions, for very shortly the dungeon door was flung open and Snape stalked back into the room, his black robes swirling about his ankles and a horrible snarl twisting his features.

"Professor—" Aeryn began, but the Potions master crossed the room in three long steps and swooped down on her desk like a malevolent bat. Aeryn crawled backwards in her chair as Snape pressed into her space, his face bare inches from hers.

"I cannot believe that even you would be dense enough to do what you just did," he hissed in a terrible voice. "The Headmaster is gone, Hogwarts is falling apart around my ears, McGonagall is breathing fire for all of the professors for us to try and catch the culprit—" A spasm of fury contorted his face and he whipped a finger beneath her nose. "And now you, acting like a complete imbecile in class and, with your cleverly chosen phrases, almost blowing away everything I have tried so hard to keep together!"

Aeryn cringed in her seat. "I—"

"I’m sure you haven’t noticed, Miss Blake," the Potions master growled, freezing the words in her throat, "but there are many things going on at Hogwarts that none of us—not even I—could have anticipated. The students are terrified, and the professors are not much better. The last thing we need—I need—is you! Of all the stupid, juvenile, vicious…"

His hands lifted jerkily from the desk, and for a second Aeryn was terrified that he was about to wrap them around her throat. But instead, he abruptly straightened, drawing himself up to his full height to tower above her.

"You had better have an extremely good reason for what you did in class today," he whispered in a horrible voice. He crossed his arms across his chest and stared down his hooked nose at her with a heat in his eyes that could melt the Antarctic. "And I warn you, if it is anything less than Lockhart raping you in the hallway between class, I promise that you will spend the rest of the school year scraping the remnants of the first yearÂ’s potion-making attempts from the bottoms of their cauldrons with your fingernails."

Utterly stung at his cold words, Aeryn could only stare disbelievingly up at the Potions master. She opened her mouth, trying to say the sharp words she had been planning. "IÂ…" she whimpered, and to her horror, her vision blurred and huge tears suddenly began to roll down her cheeks.

At the sight of her tears, the anger locking SnapeÂ’s features melted away immediately. "What happened?" he demanded, worry and concern tightening his voice. He swiftly leaned back over the desk and grabbed her hands in his. "Are you all right? What did he do to you?"

With a furious cry, Aeryn pulled her hands away from him. "He hasn’t done anything!" she exclaimed, brushing a fist angrily across her cheeks. "I’m just upset, all right? I’m—just—"

She drew a deep, shuddering breath, and dug the heels of her palms into her eyes. "One of my friends was attacked—and you don’t even seem to care, you let Malfoy—joke about it in class—" She swallowed glared up at him, feeling quivers begin to wrack her body. "And I can’t—I’m so worried about the rest of them, I mean—if Hogwarts closes—they have nowhere else to go, and then what will happen?"

The Potions master slowly drew away from her, backing up until he was leaning against his desk, his coal-black eyes calm as he regarded her. She could feel a sob welling in her throat, and she had to fight it back. "And it’s such a struggle—with you—and Lockhart—he can’t do anything to me right now, there’s too many people around and I know that, but that doesn’t stop him from looking at me—" A half-cry, half-whimper escaped from her lips. "I know he’ll just grab me, whenever he gets the chance, and I can’t do anything about it, and then he says things and I can’t—"

Her voice broke, and she pressed her lips tightly together, covering her mouth with her hands.

A long, heavy silence hung in the air between them. Then, finally, Snape gave a long, tired sigh that sounded as if it came from the very soles of his boots. He stretched out a hand and beckoned to her. "Come here, Miss Blake."

Aeryn sniffed and wiped her nose on her sleeve.

He raised an eyebrow and beckoned again. "Come here, Miss Blake."

Aeryn was ready to snap at him and tell him to stop ordering her around, but for once, SnapeÂ’s black eyes were not filled with condescension or aloofness, but a surprising gentleness. Dashing a lingering tear from her eyes, Aeryn huffily got to her feet and flounced up to his desk.

"What?" she muttered thickly.

The Potions master leaned forward and wrapped her hand in his. Caught off-guard at this uncharacteristic action, Aeryn allowed him to gently pull her into a sitting position next to him on the desk. Snape placed his hands on her shoulders and looked her square in the face.

"Now," he said. "I understand your concern about Miss Granger, but itÂ’s not quite as bad as youÂ’re making it out to be. Professor SproutÂ’s Mandrakes are nearly mature, and theyÂ’ll soon be able to restore her, correct?"

She sniffed and wiped the last vestige of moisture from her cheeks. "Yeah."

"And do you really think that, with all this tightened security around the castle, someone will have the opportunity to attack your friends?"

Aeryn decided that it would probably not be in her best interest to disclose to Snape her friendsÂ’ late-night excursions, so she merely shrugged. "I suppose not," she mumbled.

"All right, then." A serious light crept into his coal-black eyes. "Now, regarding Lockhart. Has there ever been an opportunity for him to be alone with you?"

After a moment, Aeryn shook her head. "No."

"Has he ever cornered you?"

"No," she said.

"Given any indication that he might approach you?"

Aeryn bit her lower lip and her eyes skittered from the Potions masterÂ’s face.

His hands tightened around her shoulders. "Miss Blake?"

"He snapped my bra strap last week," she said quietly.

A pregnant pause fell between them. "ThatÂ’s all he did?" Snape asked finally.

His words were light, barely concerned, and Aeryn bristled at the underlying derision in his voice. "It might not sound like much to you, Professor, but it sure as hell bothered me," she spat.

Another silence fell, but this time it Aeryn could almost feel the anger wafting from Snape. "You should have told me about it earlier," he said, and his voice was taut.

Aeryn shrugged. "You havenÂ’t exactly been approachable over the last few weeks."

His hands slid from her shoulders. "Touché."

Aeryn suppressed a shudder and turned away from him. Her eyes grazed to the pickled animals lining the walls, and she wrapped her arms around herself, noticing for the first time in a long while how the stone walls of the dungeon leached the heat from the air. Her anger had cooled, leaving behind the dregs of embarrassment. "ItÂ’s just been hard," she murmured after a long moment. She sighed and gnawed on her lower lip. She hated crying. "ThatÂ’s all."

There was a rustle of silk in the quiet air as Snape put his arm around her shoulders. "It will be all right," he murmured comfortingly, squeezing her to him in a gentle half-hug.

Aeryn rolled her eyes, but a tiny smile flickered across her lips.

"Now," he said, the professorial diction creeping back into his words. "As for your detention."

The smile fled from AerynÂ’s lips. "What?"

"Your conduct in class today was completely unacceptable, Miss Blake," he said calmly. He slipped his arm from her shoulders and shook his head slightly.

Aeryn openly stared at him. "But Malfoy was—"

"Do your best not to whine, Miss Blake," the Potions master interrupted sternly. "I do not and will not allow fighting—or the type of language you used—in my classroom. I demand my students to have a vestige of self-control."

"Just like you," Aeryn snapped back.

She had the distinct pleasure of watching the muscles of his face tighten. "Watch your words, Miss Blake," Snape murmured, forcing his features to smooth with an obvious effort.

Aeryn wisely fell silent.

Snape sighed. "I understand there are extenuating circumstances that provoked your actions—"

"He deserved it," Aeryn muttered.

"Miss Blake!" The Potions master whipped a finger beneath her nose warningly. "If you interrupt me a third time, you will lose twenty points for Gryffindor!"

Aeryn pressed her lips tightly together.

Snape pinched the bridge of his nose and closed his eyes. "I cannot afford to play favorites with you, Miss Blake, as IÂ’m certain you realize."

She said nothing.

He sighed again and dropped his hand. "Since it is unsafe for you to wander the hallways at night, I will come to the Gryffindor common room for you at eight oÂ’clock and escort you to your detention."

Aeryn glowered at him.

Snape turned to look at her and raised an eyebrow at her scowl. "Really, Miss Blake," he said in a gentler voice. "It wonÂ’t be as bad as all that."

"YouÂ’re being unfair," she growled between clenched teeth.

The Potions master shrugged. "ThatÂ’s one of the more flattering phrases youÂ’ve used to describe me," he said simply.

Aeryn folded her arms across her chest in a huff.

A semblance of a chuckle escaped SnapeÂ’s throat, and he waved a handkerchief in front of AerynÂ’s face. "Here," he said, an air of amusement lightening his voice. "Blow your nose and IÂ’ll take you to Herbology."

* * *

"WeÂ’re going into the Forbidden Forest tonight," Harry whispered into her ear in the Gryffindor common room.

AerynÂ’s pen jerked up from the paper she was writing for Care of Magical Creatures, leaving a huge splotch of ink on the parchment. "What?" she hissed, blotting quickly at the ink.

Harry took the seat next to her and leaned over, keeping his voice low so the crowded common room wouldnÂ’t hear his words. "Hagrid told Ron and me that if we wanted to find out anything, weÂ’d have to follow the spiders." He drew his wand and tapped the tip against the parchment. The blotch of ink disappeared in a small burst of white light. "And we saw some spiders this morning, and theyÂ’re headed into the Forbidden Forest," he continued, pushing a handful of jet-black hair out of his eyes. "So thatÂ’s where weÂ’ve got to go."

Aeryn stared disbelievingly at him. "You can’t be serious!" she sputtered, trying not to raise her voice. "You can’t go in there—there are dangerous things—werewolves, big…monsters…."

"There arenÂ’t all bad things in there," Harry retorted, but he looked rather uncomfortable. "There are centaurs, and unicornsÂ…."

Aeryn was not convinced. She had no desire to meet a centaur—which, she understood, were rather cryptic and aloof, and in that case she might just as well hold a conversation with Professor Binns—and she was frightened to death of what a unicorn might do if it saw her. "Harry, honestly, I know Hagrid told you to follow the spiders, but still…can’t you do it in the morning or something, when it’s light?"

"There’s no other time do to it but when everyone else is sleeping," Harry said. "And we’ve got to do it tonight, Aeryn—there might be another attack tomorrow if not. Are you going to come?"

"Are you insane?"

She stifled a sigh as an upset look tightened Harry’s face. She didn’t want to go, she didn’t want them to go, it wasn’t safe, even with all the heightened security around the castle…but Hermione was attacked, shouldn’t you do something about it, asked a little corner of her mind. Aeryn bit her lip. As the adult of the group, she should demand that they stay in the castle tonight, but—

She glanced over at the grandfather clock in the corner. Seven fifty-five. "All right," she said, trying to keep the irritation from her voice. "IÂ’ve got detention with Snape at eight. Wait for me in the common room until I get back." She pointed a warning finger at Harry. "IÂ’ll help you guys get out of the castle and follow you to HagridÂ’s cabin, but thatÂ’s it."

She picked up her quill and bent back over her essay, ignoring the relieved grin that spread across HarryÂ’s features.

There was a soft whirr and then the grandfather clock began to ring: eight, long, sonorous chimes. As the peals died away, the portrait of the Fat Lady swung open, and the whole of Gryffindor House turned and stared in disbelief as Professor Severus Snape crawled through the portrait hole.

His gaze locked onto her. Aeryn laid her quill down with suddenly sweating hands.

"Miss Blake," the Potions master said in a low voice, and his words echoed in the still air. Aeryn slowly got to her feet and walked over towards him, trying not to flinch as she felt many pairs of eyes follow her movements. Snape turned on his heel in a swirl of black robes and exited the common room, Aeryn following behind him.

Neither of them spoke as they walked down the staircase and into the Great Hall. Aeryn had to hurry to keep up with the long-legged professor as he navigated the twisting hallways, up and down different staircases, and through hidden doors behind tapestries and behind suits of armor. Finally, after what seemed like hours, Snape creaked open a heavy oaken door to reveal a dusty, abandoned chamber and ushered Aeryn through.

Aeryn looked around her in surprise. The room was completely empty, save for a huge mirror spanning the length of the far wall. Curious, Aeryn walked towards it. The reflective surface was dull and tarnished from years of disuse, and the molded trim was black with age. She put out a hand and gently touched the silvered surface, and a faint reflection echoed her, weirdly distorted by the dirt and grime.

"Do you know what this is, Miss Blake?" The Potions master appeared at her shoulder.

Aeryn shrugged. "ItÂ’s a mirror."

"Not just a mirror," Snape corrected her coldly. He motioned towards the object sharply with one hand. "This is one of the first magical mirrors ever created. It used to hang in the Great Hall of Hogwarts, until the Ministry of Magic demanded it be banished."

AerynÂ’s fingers dropped from the surface of the mirror. "Why did they do that?" she asked, squinting her eyes to peer at the grimed border. She could see faint whorls, etched figures, but beyond that, nothing.

"Because," Snape said, "this mirror was ensorcelled to tell the viewer whatever he needed to hear."

Aeryn glanced over at him. The Potions master’s hands were clasped behind his back, and there was an odd tautness to the set of his features, a rigidity in his squared shoulders. "That’s not so bad," she began carefully. "Actually, that sounds rather—"

Snape cut her off with a wave of his hand. "What the viewer needed to hear, Miss Blake. Not what he wanted to hear, or even what he should hear." He folded his arms across his chest, his coal-black eyes gazing searchingly into the encrusted mirror. "The mirror reflected the viewer’s deep-buried images of himself and flung them back into his face—for, in order to keep viewing himself in the same way, he needed to hear someone other than himself voice those opinions."

There was something in his voice that made the hair on the back of AerynÂ’s neck prickle. "I still donÂ’t see the problem," she murmured.

His head whipped around, and Aeryn shrank at the ferocious intensity of his gaze. "Don’t you?" the Potions master sneered, the edge of his lip curling in a snarl. "Mediocre wizards would stand in front of the glass and were told how wonderful their talents were—and then the next day the idiots would race out to slay a dragon and get themselves killed."

AerynÂ’s head lolled backwards as the Potions master stalked towards her, towering above her like a malicious sentinel. "An exceedingly beautiful witch once stood in front of this mirror," he hissed, "and was told if it wasnÂ’t for her hands, she would be irresistible." He bent his neck until his nose was almost touching hers. "The very next day, she had them chopped off."

The weight of the still, dusty air pressed like a weight into AerynÂ’s shoulders. "Why would anyone do something as stupid as that?" she whispered.

For a very long moment, neither of them moved, and Aeryn thought she would go blind beneath his intense gaze. Then he stepped away from her, and his eyes slid once more to the mirror. "Because they believed the words of the mirror," he said in his clipped professorial diction, turning towards the mirror. He stretched out one hand and gently laid his palm against the dulled surface. "Contrary to the stereotype, Miss Blake, magical mirrors do not tell the truth." The pads of his fingertips tapped against the glass. "They only reflect—it is up to us to form the conclusions."

A shudder lightninged down her spine, but Aeryn did not move. Her palms were sweaty against the fabric of her robe, and her breath was uncommonly loud in the room. She wondered if he could hear her heart beating, the air was so still. SnapeÂ’s form was so motionless that, for an instant, she thought he had turned into stone.

"Once, a long time ago, there was a boy," the Potions master whispered in a voice so rough that AerynÂ’s breath caught in her throat. "A mere boyÂ…a stupid, foolish boy who allowed himself to be swayed by the hypnotizing power of words. He would fly into a murderous rage at those who would mock him, and the slightest praise would turn his head until he was unable to see what was before him."

He cleared his throat violently. "Then one day, the boy met a true weaver of words, a powerful man who could twist and bend the truth into whatever reality he wished it to be. The man whispered unimaginable glories and promises into the boyÂ’s ears, and the boy believed the manipulative, seductive whispers."

SnapeÂ’s hand slid limply down the mirror. "And thus the boy began his long descent into Hell."

Aeryn swallowed hard. Her fists knotted in the fabric of her robes, but her eyes never left the Potions masterÂ’s form. She could see the muscles of his shoulders bunch beneath his robe, and his fingers reflexively clench and unclench against his side.

"One terrifying day," Snape murmured, "the boy saw through the false promises of the manipulator and realized the truth." He drew a deep breath and uncurled his hands with what appeared to be a great effort. "He was eventually able to claw himself from the pit of lies and manipulations to save himself."

He took a step away from the mirror, and for the first time Aeryn was able to see the lines of pain and grief etching his face. "That boy still lives." His lips twitched. "But he is now a hard, cold, bitter man whose dark past haunts him every waking moment, and who wears scars upon his soul and body that will never fade, not even after the passing of a hundred years."

He turned his head and gazed at her, and the shadows rimming his coal-black eyes were deep with despair. Aeryn did not move as he advanced towards her.

"Do not allow the words of others to control you, Miss Blake," he whispered. "For words are merely sound and silence. They are neither truth nor lies, neither good nor evil—unless you permit them to be."

Utterly beyond speech, Aeryn could only stare up at him. The last remains of the professorial veneer had crumbled away, leaving the tired face of a man twice her age; a man who had seen too much of the world too quickly; a man who, in another life, could have been happyÂ….

SnapeÂ’s eyes slipped from hers and, once again, his coal-black gaze caught the mirror.

"It is such a fine line that separates good and evil," he murmured, as if to himself, but his words echoed clearly in the still air.

Aeryn lifted a hand to pull a strand of hair away from her eyes, and realized her fingers were trembling like poplar leaves.

For a long moment, Snape regarded the mirror. When he turned back to her, Aeryn could see that whatever veil had been lifted from his soul had been drawn back into place, leaving only the role of the Potions master. "That is all, Miss Blake," he murmured, his eyes and voice once again unreadable.

In silence, they retraced their steps through the halls and climbed up the stairs to Gryffindor Tower. Snape paused at the portrait of the Fat Lady. "You will be all right from here," he said.

Aeryn mumbled the password and crawled into the common room. She felt like she should say something—anything—but when she turned around to call him back, the Potions master had already disappeared down the staircase.

* * *

Aeryn patiently waited as Fred, George, Harry, and Ron played several games of Exploding Snap. Harry and Ron kept losing on purpose, trying to finish the games quickly, but even so, it was well past midnight when Fred and George finally went to bed. The three waited for the distant sound of a dormitory door closing before the boys seized HarryÂ’s Invisibility Cloak and climbed through the portrait hole, followed by the illusion-shrouded Aeryn.

The journey through the dark and deserted castle corridors wasnÂ’t enjoyable. Aeryn, who had wandered the castle at night many times, had never seen it so crowded after sunset. Teachers, prefects, and ghosts were marching the corridors in pairs, staring around for any unusual activity. AerynÂ’s illusion didnÂ’t stop her from making noise, and there was a particularly tense moment when Ron stubbed his toe only yards from the spot where Snape stood standing guard. Thankfully, Snape sneezed at almost exactly the moment Ron swore. It was with relief that they reached the oak front doors and eased them open, stepping out into the moonlit grounds.

"Â’Course," said Ron abruptly as they strode across the black grass, "we might get to the forest and find thereÂ’s nothing to follow. Those spiders might notÂ’ve been going there at all. I know it looked like they were moving in that sort of general direction, butÂ…"

His voice trailed away hopefully.

They reached HagridÂ’s house, sad and sorry-looking with its blank windows. When Harry pushed the door open, Fang went mad with joy at the sight of them. Worried he might wake everyone at the castle with his deep, booming barks, they hastily fed him treacle fudge from a tin on the mantelpiece, which glued his teeth together.

"Here," Harry said, handing Aeryn his Invisibility Cloak. "We wonÂ’t need this in the forest."

"You sure you wonÂ’t come?" asked Ron, his face pinched and pale. "We could use your help."

Aeryn shuddered to think of a scenario where she could be more useful than Fang the boarhound. "I wonÂ’t come with you," she said slowly, "but I can do something that might help you out." She beckoned to them. "Come here."

After a second, Harry and Ron nervously shuffled towards her. Aeryn placed her palms against their foreheads and closed her eyes, concentrating deeply. Very gently, she quested into their minds; her fingers curling only slightly as she felt their emotions flood her consciousness.

"WhatÂ’re you doing?" Harry asked curiously.

AerynÂ’s brow furrowed as she tried to wrap part her mind around his consciousness. "Harry, you know how every different person has a different fingerprint?"

"Yeah."

"Every different person also has a distinct mind-pattern, which if you know how to read it, can tell you how that person is feeling. With just a little work, itÂ’s not too terribly difficult for a telepath to locate the mind-waves of a person she knows." It was sort of like trying to wrap a huge, bulky package with a slender strand of twine, but she successfully marked HarryÂ’s mind and turned her full attention to Ron. "What IÂ’m going to do know is make a link with your minds to mine, so IÂ’ll be able to know whatÂ’s happening with you, even if IÂ’m not there."

She could feel the discomfort wafting from Ron. "So, youÂ’re going to be reading our minds?" he asked uncertainly.

"No," Aeryn declared a shade more vehemently than she would have liked. She fell silent for a moment, concentrating on the boy’s mind-waves, and then continued with her explanation. "For example, if something should—" not a good analogy, think of something else— "um, if you run into an unsafe situation, your mind-patterns should register immense fear, and that’s what I’m going to read back here."

Her mind slipped around RonÂ’s consciousness like an elastic band, and Aeryn opened her eyes. Two pairs of eyes, one jade-green and the other velvety-brown, stared hesitantly back at her. She pulled her hands away from their foreheads, feeling their apprehension echoed in her mind like an aforethought, like the remnants of a stomachache. "It works," she said cheerfully, and was rewarded by two slightly weak smiles.

"Guess weÂ’re off, then," Ron said, trying to sound cheerful but falling slightly short. He squared his shoulders determinedly and headed out of the cabin.

"CÂ’mon, Fang, weÂ’re going for a walk," said Harry, patting his leg, and Fang bounded happily out of the house behind the boys. Aeryn solemnly watched them light their wands and disappear into the blackness of the forest. When she could no longer see the faint glow of the lumos spell, she quietly shut the door of the cabin and sat down at the splintering table.

She drew T.M. RiddleÂ’s diary from her pocket, followed by a small inkwell and quill pen. She stared at the objects for a moment, a small furrow creasing her brow. Then, she picked up the quill pen and began to write.

Hello, Tom.

The response was almost immediate. "Aeryn, IÂ’m so glad to hear from you." The words oozed smoothly from the page beneath her fingers. "I was beginning to wonder whether you had tired of my conversation."

Of course not, Tom, Aeryn lied just as smoothly. I find you immensely intriguing. At least, she told herself, that much was true.

"And I, you. I find it wonderful that you were given the opportunity to study at Hogwarts, considering your age. In my day, such a thing would have been unheard of. How fortunate indeed that times have changed."

How fortunate indeed. Aeryn was dying to ask the diary more about the Chamber of Secrets, to press Tom for the answers, but instead she dipped her quill in the inkwell and wrote, I agree. Hogwarts has pretty much become my home.

There was a small pause before the next words rose on the paper, gleaming wetly in the flickering lantern-light. "Are your parents dead, Aeryn?"

Aeryn’s breath snagged in her throat, and her fingers constricted around her eagle-quill pen. After a moment, she pressed her lips together and forced the pen to move. Yes. (Who would have known that a three-letter word would be so difficult to write?) Tom, I—

"I was an orphan when I came to Hogwarts, as well," the diary interrupted, ink welling up from the page beneath her fingers. "Funny, do you not find it, that you, Harry, and I are interconnected in such a way? All missing parents, all caught up in the mystery of the Chamber of SecretsÂ…"

TomÂ’s words trailed away into the page, but before Aeryn could write a suitable answer, he spoke again, the letters burning brightly against the stark white paper. "If you donÂ’t mind my asking, Aeryn, how did they die?"

It was as if someone had slammed a sledgehammer into her stomach. For a moment, all she could hear was the sudden roaring of blood in her ears. Bile rose in her throat, and all sorts of memories and thoughts buzzed in her mind like bees in a jar. She could feel the ropes on her wrists, here the gurgle as her mother—

I mind, Tom.

She slashed the words across the page, her pen strokes thick and clumsy. Very much.

The words sank into the paper, and Aeryn realized that her hands were trembling violently.

"Forgive me."

As TomÂ’s words spread across the page, Aeryn felt a surging flood of emotion beneath her fingertips. PityÂ…the most obvious, the taste was almost tangible in her mouthÂ…doubt, but for what, she couldnÂ’t quite place itÂ…and the faintest hint ofÂ…anger? "For over fifty years, I have been unable to hone my skills of conversation, and I fear they have fallen into disrepair and are now merely clumsy and blunt. I did not mean to cause you pain."

Aeryn lifted her hands away from the diary. She could notÂ…she would notÂ…

"Perhaps I have become so far removed from the land of the living that I can only relate to those aspects closest to death."

She laid her eagle-quill pen down next to the tome. TomÂ’s words sucked back into the page, leaving only a blank sheet of white paper. It was a few seconds before Aeryn realized the sharp pain in her chest. She attempted to breathe normally, but the air caught in her throat, leaving her only shallow gasps that made her head spin.

She would notÂ….

"Aeryn."

Aeryn bit her lip. There was a heavy lump in the base of her throat, and she coughed awkwardly.

"My mother died when I was very young, when I was only two."

Tom’s words spread across the page slowly and in small letters, as if it was a great effort for him to write the words. "I only have a few fuzzy, half-formed memories of her. She was beautiful…but sad, always sad. And she was always sick—for one reason or another—I think it was because she was so frail, with a spirit too ethereal for her earthly form. It was not a great surprise when she died, I think. For her, I believe, it was almost a relief."

He paused, and then added in tiny letters that Aeryn had to strain to decipher: "I was told she died of a broken heart."

Tom’s pen strokes became clearer, with an odd rigidity analogous to Snape’s cold professorial diction. "I never knew my father. He was a Muggle who, when he married my mother, had no idea that she was a witch. When he discovered her secret, he abandoned her—six months pregnant with me, with no family to speak of, and nowhere to go."

Another pause, and the words that welled from within the diary were sharply formed, terse and tidy as a dissertation. "But she still loved him. She loved him up until the end, even after all he had done to her."

Slowly, Aeryn stretched out a hand and laid a finger against the diaryÂ’s blank page. Sorrow and anger and pain, almost overwhelming in their intensity, met her touch. Sympathetic tears sprang into her eyes, and she blinked them back, trying to keep herself focused. She could almost see the young Tom Riddle, brilliant yet sad, struggling through his years at Hogwarts to find a place where he could fit in, be acceptedÂ….

Aeryn grabbed her quill and dipped it swiftly into the inkwell. She hesitated only slightly over the blank page before writing in a clear, level hand: I was fifteen years old when my parents were murdered.

"They were murdered?" His words came quickly.

Yes.

"Aeryn, I am so terribly sorry."

Shock frissoned through the page beneath her fingers. "Had I known they wereÂ…I never would have asked."

AerynÂ’s shoulders rose and fell as she breathed deeply, struggling to remain in control. The nib of her pen touched the paper and she began to write, slowly at first, and then with increasing intensity. It happened on my birthday, six years ago. Two very powerful people broke into my house andÂ…killed them. IÂ’ve never spoken to anyone about it.

"ThatÂ’s completely understandable." TomÂ’s words were like a gentle purr in her mind. "How horrible. Did you find them dead?"

No. IÂ…She forced her pen to move. I was forced to watch.

An engulfing burst of empathy rushed from the open page. "Oh, my dear," Riddle replied. "Words cannot express my sympathy. But, as I have been reduced to mere words, please accept my humble, clumsy condolences in the spirit which they are given."

"ItÂ’s a little late for that," Aeryn whispered to herself, but she merely wrote: Thank you, Tom.

"But you escaped the murderers, and for that, at least, I am thankful. How on earth did you survive?"

She wanted to slam the diary shut, to toss T.M. Riddle and his collective memory out the window of HagridÂ’s cabin, to bury it deep within the ground of the Forbidden Forest, so she could block out his horribly acute words, so she wouldnÂ’t have to answer him. But the memory of Hermione lying glassy-eyed on a hospital bed stilled her fingers, and the thought of Hagrid, now languishing in the wizard prison of AzkabanÂ….

She had made far greater sacrifices than this, for far more selfish reasons. Why, then, did this feel as if she was flaying open her soul? She closed her eyes only momentarily, then opened them and began to write.

The two who killed my parents wereÂ…

(the word stung her, but she had to write it)Â…mutants. I donÂ’t know how much you know of mutants, if there were many around your timeÂ…

"IÂ’m aware of them, yes."

RiddleÂ’s answer spilled immediately over the page.

The cold October night surged into her memory, and every instant of the piercingly clear memory struck her like a tiny, precise dart. But she squared her jaw and loaded her quill with ink.

But these two mutants—two very powerful mutants—they wanted my father to join them in their cause, fighting against ordinary people because he was a wizard, different, like them

Â…(how odd it felt to write those words, to consider mutants and wizards to be lumped together in the same group)Â…But he wouldnÂ’t. So they killed my mother. The pen trembled in her fingers, but she continued doggedly. And thenÂ…they were going to kill meÂ…butÂ…Dad got my hands free, and then I was able toÂ…

She stopped suddenly, the gravity of what she was doing striking her in the face. She stared down at her words on the page, horror-struck.

"What, Aeryn?"

TomÂ’s words oozed from the page, and along with it Aeryn felt the same eagerness she had sensed the first evening; desirous, craving, and utterly out of place. "You were able to what?"

Aeryn swallowed hard. Slowly, very slowly, she brought her pen back to the paper. I…Her inner being screamed at her not to write anymore, to disclose no more to this unseen being. But she had started down a slope on which there was no stopping. I was able to—

A shockwave of utter, absolute terror rushed through her body, and she gave a loud cry, dropping the pen to the table and looking about her wildly. The terror rushed through her again, and it took her less than an instant to know it was coming from Harry and Ron. Something had gone horribly, completely wrong. She scrabbled for the quill pen, her fingers clumsy, and slashed three words across the blank page in huge, sloppy handwriting:

—Harry and Ron—

The cabin door sprang open and Aeryn bolted through, feeling out before her with her mind. The chill air bit her cheeks as she ran across the dew-sprinkled grass and into the foreboding line of dark trees. Her vision was instantly dampened as the trees closed around her until even the stars overhead were no longer visible. Aeryn slackened in her pace only an instant to draw her wand from her sleeve.

"Lumos,"

she panted, leaping over a tree root. The wand gave a weak sizzle and spat out a shower of sparks that died within seconds, but for a moment, Aeryn was able to distinguish the path. Muttering the word like a leitmotif beneath her breath, she spun the wand in her fingers, and the ground before her was suddenly illuminated with short, sparkling bursts of light.

The boys’ fear leached through her bones like a chilling frost, and she pushed herself to run faster, faster, not knowing what on earth she could do to help them but knowing she had to get there before anything else happened—

She stumbled into a clearing and a sudden blaze of light burst in her face, so bright in the darkness that she instinctively flung up her hands to shield her eyes. A long, mournful honk filled the air.

Aeryn squinted into the light, and saw a blue car, scratched and smeared with mud, rolling towards her. She screamed, and the car halted dead in its tracks as if it had been struck.

"Wha—what—" Aeryn stammered, but was cut off as an agitated toot of the horn split the air. The car swerved its front wheels back and forth in the underbrush, looking exactly like a dog trying to get its owner’s attention. She tried to peer into the front seat to see the driver, to try and get his attention—but there was no driver.

The car honked.

AerynÂ’s hands flew to her ears to block out the sound, and she winced as another burst of pure terror siphoned through her mind-link to the boys.

The car honked again, this time decisively frantic.

"All right!"

Aeryn shrieked at the blue machine, and dove for the driverÂ’s side, yanking it open. She reached for the accelerator, but was thrown back against the seat as the car shot forward, knocking branches aside and sending leaves everywhere. Aeryn was jolted to the side as the car swerved through the forest, and she grabbed tightly onto the wheel to keep from being thrown from the vehicle.

Another burst of fear, not too far away, rang through her blood.

"LEFT! TURN LEFT!" she yelled, and the car immediately obeyed her command. She swore and gripped the wheel even more tightly, feeling more than one fingernail tear away with the effort. The boys were close, so close—and there was something else with them, something huge, and intent on—

"FORWARD! NOW!"

Sounding its horn like a battle cry, the car careened through a thick wall of trees with a stomach-turning crunch, and they skidded into a large, grassy hollow.

Had she any breath left in her lungs, Aeryn would have screamed until she was hoarse. The hollow was filled with spiders. Not tiny spiders like those she had seen curled in the corners of the hallways. Spiders the size of carthorses, eight-eyed, eight-legged, black, hairy, gigantic, who whirled around towards the car and clicked their pincers threateningly. The car shot through the hollow like a bullet, knocking spiders aside and honking frantically. Aeryn wildly glanced around her and saw Harry and Ron, their faces pale with fright as they brandished their wands in their hands.

The car skidded to a halt in front of them, the passenger doors flew open, and Aeryn found her voice.

"GET IN THE CAR! GET IN THE CAR!" Two spiders rushed towards them as Ron tossed Fang the boarhound into the back of the car, but Aeryn flung up her hands and sent the arachnids flying with a furious mind-slam. She didnÂ’t touch the accelerator but the car didnÂ’t need her; the engine roared and they were off, hitting more spiders. They sped up the slope, out of the hollow, and they were soon crashing through the forest, branches whipping the windows as the car wound its way cleverly through the widest gaps, following a path it obviously knew.

Aeryn slumped back against the bucket seat, her heart pounding so fiercely in her chest that she was surprised it hadnÂ’t ruptured. She wearily turned her head and looked over at Harry, sitting next to her in the front seat. His jade-green eyes were huge, and for a moment it looked as if he wasnÂ’t breathing. Then, he drew a deep breath and closed his eyes.

"WhatÂ…" Her voice was hoarse and sounded as if she had just returned from a rowdy football match. "Harry, what the hell happened?"

Harry slowly turned his head and looked at her. "We followed the spiders," he said weakly. He lifted a hand and waved it half-heartedly in the air. "And we got into this clearing, and we were captured by these—those huge spiders—" He shuddered "—and they took us to their leader, Aragog, and it turns out he was the creature that Hagrid had raised, the one that Riddle was talking about."

Harry ran a hand through his mop of jet-black hair. "Aragog said that he had been blamed for killing a girl—the one that Riddle told me about—so Hagrid had to let him go in the forest so he wouldn’t be destroyed." He shrugged and closed his eyes again. "And then he was going to let the other spiders eat us. Then you and Mr. Weasley’s car came."

"Mr. WeasleyÂ’s car?" She looked down at the scratched and dirty car beneath her.

"Yeah." Harry sounded exhausted. "The forest turned it wild."

It made as much sense as anything she had seen today. "So what killed the girl, if the spider didnÂ’t?" she asked, ducking involuntarily as the car crashed into a heavy branch, nearly cracking the windshield open.

"Aragog said that it was the creature from the chamber." Harry sighed. "He said he had been blamed, because her body had been found in a bathroom near the cupboard where he lived. But he wouldnÂ’t tell us what killed her, it seemed as if heÂ…he didnÂ’t even want to mention it, like itÂ’s some kind of animal Voldemort or something."

Aeryn nodded. "So HagridÂ’s innocent, then?"

The car stopped so suddenly that they were nearly thrown into the windshield. They had reached the edge of the forest. Fang flung himself at the window in his anxiety to get out, and when Harry opened the door, he shot off through the trees to HagridÂ’s house, tail between his legs. Harry and Aeryn got out too, and after a moment or two, Ron seemed to regain the feeling in his limbs and followed, stiff-necked and staring.

As Harry gave the car a grateful pat, Aeryn suddenly remembered RiddleÂ’s diary still sitting on the table, and she rushed into the cabin to retrieve it. She shoved it into her pocket seconds before Harry came into the cabin for his Invisibility Cloak. Fang was trembling under a blanket in his basket. When Harry and Aeryn got outside again, they found Ron being violently sick in the pumpkin patch.

"Follow the spiders," said Ron weakly, wiping his mouth on his sleeve as Harry and Aeryn approached. "IÂ’ll never forgive Hagrid. WeÂ’re lucky to be alive."

"I bet he thought Aragog wouldnÂ’t hurt friends of his," said Harry.

"ThatÂ’s exactly HagridÂ’s problem!" said Ron, thumping the wall of the cabin. "He always thinks monsters arenÂ’t as bad as theyÂ’re made out, and look where itÂ’s got him! A cell in Azkaban!" He was shivering uncontrollably now. "What was the point of sending us in there? What have we found out, IÂ’d like to know?"

"That Hagrid never opened the Chamber of Secrets," said Aeryn. "He was innocent."

Harry threw the Invisibility Cloak over Ron and the two disappeared before her eyes instantly. She dropped an illusion of invisibility over herself and they started off towards the castle. They pushed the creaking front doors ajar and walked carefully back across the entrance hall and up the marble staircase, holding their breath as they passed corridors where watchful sentries were walking. At last they reached the safety of the Gryffindor common room, where the fire had burned itself into glowing ash. The boys removed the cloak and Aeryn dissolved the illusion, and they climbed the winding stair to their dormitory.

"Sleep well," Aeryn whispered to her friends at the fork in the staircase, and continued up the stairs to her dormitory. She very carefully pushed the door open and tiptoed over to her scarlet four-poster. Wearily, she collapsed on the bed and crawled under the covers. She burrowed contentedly into her pillow, but even as her eyelids drooped, her mind worked furiously.

Hagrid didnÂ’t open the Chamber of Secrets,

she thought sleepily, yawning until her jaw cracked. So who on earth did? And does Lockhart fit into this equation at all, orÂ…her thoughts trailed off into a fuzzy haze, and she closed her eyes contentedly. And why would Tom lie to both me and Harry, saying that HagridÂ…caused that girl to be killedÂ…whoever she wasÂ…but she wearily determined that she would think about it tomorrow, not now, she was too tired, she didnÂ’t have the energy to determine who killed whom where and in which bathroomÂ…

Bathroom

Â….

And then suddenly the answer hit her like a bolt of lightning, and she sat straight up.

Moaning Myrtle.

~*~*~*~*~*~