Harry Potter and the Curse of Ages

Chapter 11 Into the Chamber of Secrets

Professor Dumbledore glanced around Moaning Myrtle's bathroom. Then he raised his hand like he was feeling for a gentle breeze. "Somewhere over here, isn't it, Harry? Excellent. Now that I have the general feel, why don't you show me the entrance to the Chamber."

Harry led the way to the sinks and pointed out the snake scratched into the faucet. He started to work on speaking in parseltongue, but was stopped by Professor Dumbledore. "Not yet, Harry. I'd like to examine it in detail unopened while you duplicate your memories of making Polyjuice Potion here."

Harry's head jerked toward Dumbledore. "You know about that? I specifically left that out when I told about the Chamber that year. I didn't want to get Hermione in trouble."

Dumbledore gave a cock-eyed smile. "I've already told you, dear boy, that you have been watched most of your life more closely than you could have imagined. In this case, however, I got reports from Myrtle."

"How did you know to speak with her?"

"When Mrs. Norris was petrified right outside this bathroom, I remembered that Myrtle had been killed here the last time the Chamber was opened. It seemed too much of a coincidence, so I asked Myrtle to tell me anything unusual she saw. One of those things was a trio of second-years brewing a potion in a stall."

"You didn't stop us?"

"Is that a question or a statement? Of course you know I didn't, so I assume you are concerned with why. The short answer is that Miss Granger was doing it very well."

"Not just the Polyjuice - going into the Chamber, the whole thing."

"Yes, I thought you meant that as well. First, I did not yet know how it was being opened, so I did not know how to put a stop to that problem. More importantly, merely stopping it was not enough - there were very dangerous matters afoot. Ginny could have been taken anywhere for Riddle to steal her soul - he chose the Chamber because he wanted to lure you down as well. Until you emerged from the Chamber with the diary, I did not know how he had carried out his plans."

"How could you let me go down there like that?"

"It pained me greatly, just as giving you the chance to prove yourself the year before did. But I recognized early on in you that there is not a more resourceful wizard anywhere when it comes to acting to save someone you love."

Harry lifted his hand to gesture toward Professor Dumbledore, who stopped him before he could speak. "No, not even I am more creative and tenacious in such challenges. I have my strengths: I won't practice false modesty and deny them. And you have yours. I could recognize you as the person to end the evil of the Chamber."

Harry stared open-mouthed for several seconds; really, what was one to say in the face of such a vote of confidence, particularly as it was expressed in actions when Harry was only twelve. He had to let it sink in as Dumbledore turned to examine the entrance. Then, gathering himself again, Harry returned to the pensieve to continue the process of duplicating and storing his memories. Partway through, Dumbledore asked Harry to open the Chamber entrance, and after a couple of false starts, he did so. Dumbledore continued to examine the entrance as Harry completed preservation of his memories.

"Now, how do we enter the Chamber, Harry?" said Dumbledore when Harry was done duplicating his memories. Dumbledore and Dobby were both peering down the lightless pipe with mixed fascination and wariness.

"This pipe takes you there, like a muggle waterslide, except it was mostly slimy - it's too dark for algae so I guess it's some kind of mold growing on water condensing in the pipes. Once in it, there's really no choice but to continue to the end. It has some pretty hard bumps, even for a twelve-year-old, though, and some tight areas as well."

"Are you concerned you can no longer fit through it?"

"No, Lockhart did it, and I'm still not as large as him. I have some concern with your height and, well, erm, ... your age."

"Don't be embarrassed to say it, Harry. I'd be foolish to deny I'm an old man, and bones do get more brittle as one ages. Dobby, would you be able to apparate yourself and another person down there."

Dobby moved his hands around like they were antennas, both above and inside the pipe, and Harry recognized the gesture as Dobby feeling the magical enchantments around the place. "Dobby thinks he could do so, sir, if Dobby knew where the pipe ended and if the entrance remains open. With the entrance closed, it appears that the Charms would block any sort of apparition, even by elves or goblins."

"Harry, will the entrance close once people go down there?" asked Dumbledore.

"Yes, Albus. Otherwise finding the entrance would have been easy when Ginny was taken down there. When Fawkes carried us all back through, I had to call up through the pipe to re-open the entrance."

"Can you call to the entrance to open all the way from the end of this pipe?"

"I believe so, sir. Sound carries very well through the metal of the pipes, and parseltongue is best heard through solid objects, since snakes hear vibrations carried through the ground, not through the air - they have no external ears, you know."

"Yes, Harry, I do," said Dumbledore, with a bemused smile at Harry instructing him on something so mundane. "They would be quite a sight slithering along with pricked up fox ears, wouldn't they?"

Dobby giggled and Harry laughed at the imagery.

Dumbledore continued. "As for visiting the Chamber, I think our wisest course is for Dobby to go first so we can see how long the entrance will remain open. If it closes, Harry can re-open it and Dobby can make sure he can apparate up here. Then you can go down, Harry, and make sure that you can re-open the Chamber all the way from the end. When it is re-opened, Dobby will apparate me down there."

"That sounds like a good plan, Albus, except for one thing. Suppose I can't open it all the way from the bottom. I don't think I'll be able to crawl up the pipes far enough to do it if my voice won't carry effectively through the pipes. How would I get out?"

"That's another reason I had you preserve your memories of the previous opening of the Chamber," answered Dumbledore, as he reached for the pensieve and one of the bottles of Chamber memories. "Do you remember when I showed you my memory of Professor Trelawney's prophecy? You were able to actually hear her making it. Now that I have your memory of the opening, I can recreate your speaking of the words and it ought to open the entrance."

"Yeah, that makes sense, but it may take the physical presence or the conscious involvement of the parselmouth."

"Excellent point, Harry. When Dobby is down in the Chamber, you will leave the loo and I will conjure your memory of opening the Chamber and see if that will work without you even present in the room."

With that, Dumbledore indicated for Dobby to go down the pipe as the memory was poured into the pensieve. Dobby squealed with delight as he zoomed around the bends. "A lot easier to enjoy it," thought Harry, "when you know it can be safely done and you aren't expecting a basilisk at the end."

As they continued their complicated procedures to test openings and closings, Harry's anxiety increased. Everything went along as hoped - Dobby could apparate with things or people so long as the entrance was open, Harry could open it all the way from the end of the pipe if he spoke right next to the pipe's end, and Harry's memory of speaking parseltongue opened the Chamber entrance - but Harry was apprehensive. He told himself it was the natural result of remembering his previous visit, but he was not entirely sure. He knew there must be more enchantments and protections than just the entrance, and he was not sure that he was up to encountering them.

"Nervous, Harry?" Dumbledore interrupted Harry's train of thought after Dobby had apparated him down to the end of the pipe, where Harry stood with his wand lit, looking cautiously down the passage.

Harry's mouth was dry, so he just nodded.

"There is, of course, the strong air of longstanding magic about this place," Dumbledore added. "Do you feel it?"

Harry nodded silently again.

"A bit of nervousness is to be expected. I'd be concerned if you were flippant. I am put off by the aura of this place as well, but it is very possible that Slytherin felt that parseltongue and unplottability were all the protections this place needed. Still, let's all three keep our wits about us here."

Dumbledore conjured three large torches and lit them, as their flames would provide better light than their wands, and protection from certain possible protections, such as inferi.

"Besides," observed Harry, "there is something quite comforting about fire."

"Yes, Harry, I know what you mean. It probably goes back to the origins of humanity, when fire kept the wild beasts at bay."

"Yes, and it was the center of feasting and warmth," added Harry. Then he got a wry smile, "And a special someone in your life can seem all the more intriguing by firelight."

Dumbledore's face crinkled into a broad grin. "I believe you have mastered your fear if your mind is turning down those avenues."

When Harry and Ron had been down in the Chamber, they had not really examined it beyond looking for signs of Ginny or the basilisk. Having removed those 2 items of interest, Harry began with Dumbledore to survey the place with an eye to what else might be of interest. They walked 3 abreast keeping to the left, so they would cover everything by slowly working along the edges of the walls; the opposite wall would be examined as they returned toward the pipe. As Harry had described it, none of the known passages were so wide that they would miss anything at ground level this way, at least until they came to the main chamber where the statue of Slytherin held court over the dim glow. The initial part of the exploration revealed a fairly simple tunnel, like a mine shaft, except that stone arches had been erected so as to have supports that would not be subject to the relatively rapid decay of wood.

"Magically hewn," observed Harry, running his fingers along the wall. "I hadn't noticed that before."

"No, you wouldn't have," agreed Dumbledore. "You were quite agitated on your first visit and you are an adult now."

"I understand the first part, but what do you mean about being an adult?"

"Did you not feel yourself becoming much stronger magically last summer, Harry?"

"Well, yes, but I thought that was just the breaking down of the divide between Riddle and me - was there something more at work?"

"Yes. Wizards did not just pull that age out of the air and call it 'adult' - it is the age where a witch or wizard has a fairly sudden increase in powers, essentially to full strength, although you may get a bit stronger yet. That is almost certainly why the breakdown of the division between the two of you proceeded so briskly starting last summer. It is also one of the reasons that I never encouraged exploration of this place previously - the strength of an adult wizard is not just brute strength to do big magic, but the sensitivity and subtlety to recognize more delicate magic."

"Rather like the difference among muggles when they go on to Uni - they are exposed to more complex and subtle ideas because they generally have the maturity of mind then to comprehend them."

"That's the hope anyway. As with wizards, some never develop any real appreciation of fine distinctions at all."

Harry suddenly stopped them all. "It was just about here that we got our first jolt - stepping on a rat skull. We were already so nervous, we nearly threw up when we heard that sickly crunch." Harry examined around the center of the tunnel and a couple of yards away, he pointed and said, "Ah, yes, here it is!"

Dumbledore and Dobby came over and peered at it. "Interesting," said Dumbledore.

"What, Albus?"

"Well, Harry, this indicates several things about the enchantments here. We knew it had to be unplottable and impenetrable at least by magical beings. But the presence of a rat skeleton shows that nonmagical creatures can enter. That would, of course, have been necessary to allow the basilisk to have sufficient food to survive the thousand-odd years it was down here. The fact that there was a fairly complete skeleton shows, however, that this particular rat was not eaten. Snakes eat their prey whole, but the bones and hair are crushed into elongated pellets, rather like owl pellets but stretched. This rat must have starved or been diseased for it to have died intact."

Then Dumbledore felt around the crevices of the rough-hewn walls. "Yes, feel here, Harry, what do you make of this?"

"Definitely a magical barrier, but ... it's one way isn't it?"

"Yes. The barrier acts as a trap, to maximize the opportunity for the basilisk to discover and eat any straying creature. It also would protect the Chamber from being revealed in case somehow a muggle dug through to the barrier - the muggle would enter but be unable to leave and report the discovery. Of course, with the anti-muggle enchantments around Hogwarts and Hogsmeade, this has probably never been tested, but it shows the care with which Slytherin designed this place. He probably believed that the school would be overrun with muggles, since it was admitting those with muggle relatives."

"Do you reckon this would cover the entire chamber?" asked Harry.

"You are thinking of possible additional entrances?"

"Yes."

"I should think that the entire space is protected, but I would be surprised if your examination of it did not reveal other exits. Slytherin had to anticipate that he would not have access to the school. It was in anticipation of an eventual breakdown in the founder's relationships, after all, that the Chamber was prepared."

"Where I find a stretch of wall where the magic seems particularly strong, I'll see what I can do to work the enchantments on it. From what I've seen in here, parseltongue should do the trick."

"That definitely is the best place to start with any of the enchantments here, Harry. Slytherin believed that parseltongue was a sign of particular superiority among wizards."

"I bet that went down well with the other wizards."

Dumbledore smiled. "About as well as the muggles took to being told that wizards were superior because of the special powers they had. This reaction was, of course, encouraged by the secular and religious authorities of the day. It served as a distraction from the more immediate oppression of the common people, since the authorities often elicited the same hostility for claiming that they, as nobility and priests, were superior to their fellowman."

"Set them onto the wizards so they can go about their mischief, eh?"

"Exactly. It was quite effective, since the nobility and priests claimed divine appointment, while the wizards did not."

"That's pretty much the same strategy that wizard leaders have used - raising hatred of goblins so they could get away with stuff they otherwise wouldn't."

"Stirring up hatred to gain power is a common theme of history, and unfortunately, it is virtually never a one-way street. You get a few occasions where a group that is sufficiently lacking in power that it simply gets slaughtered or otherwise destroyed - Hitler against the Jews, the Turks against the Armenians, on some occasions, the policies of the Spanish and the British and their descendents against the American Indians were of that vein, Muslim conquerors have always pursued policies of triple taxation, degrading special laws, and enslavement against non-Muslim conquered peoples, if they did not just slaughter them outright. More often, it serves the politicians on both sides of a border to stir up animosity: the French versus the Germans, English vs. the Scots until the two joined, French vs. English, Israelis vs. the Philistines and now their descendents, well, the list goes on and on. That's barely scratching the surface."

"Is there a way to put an end to it?" asked Harry, as much to himself as Dumbledore.

"I'd be interested in any ideas. Those seeking political power have to get people to line up behind them, and they don't want to be held up to the standards of some positive idea - better from their standpoint to be able to claim success by attacking someone else."

"What about leaders that don't want power, but just to make things better?"

"Leaders like that are rare. There were those who wanted to make George Washington, the first president of the United States, a king: that land was blessed with a leader who could turn such an offer down. Mohandas Gandhi could no doubt have had great power in the new Indian republic, but he left statecraft to others. Politics is a rough business, and angels are seldom found in it and even rarer do they succeed."

"How bleak."

"It is my hope that the time will come when everyone grows up with a healthy sense of respect for their fellow beings so that they will cease to follow the politics of envy and hatred, but instead policies of cooperation and respect."

"That sounds ideal. Is there any real hope for it?" asked Harry.

Dumbledore just shrugged. "I'm afraid it's not just around the corner, but I believe humanity has progressed far already. At least from my perspective, I can see that there are many more leaders that seek cooperation amongst peoples than there were when my awareness of such things begins."