Harry wiggled his foot nervously as he waited in Potions for Professor Snape to hand back their homework assignment from the last class period. He hadn’t really put his best effort into the assignment, because he had been playing Exploding Snap with Ron and trying to decide who the Heir of Slytherin was with Ron and Hermione. And then there was the diary that he had found.

The diary had belonged to a former student of Hogwarts named Tom Riddle. The diary told him that Riddle had been a student at the school the Chamber of Secrets had been opened the last time: fifty years ago. Riddle claimed that Hagrid was the Heir, because of a large spider that he had kept as a pet, and the big man had been expelled from Hogwarts.

“Stay after class, Potter!”

The professor’s voice snapping in his ear, brought Harry’s attention back to the classroom and the boy nodded. “Yes sir.” Great…he was in trouble again. And his homework hadn’t been returned.

After class, Harry made his way up to the Potions Master’s desk. “Am I in trouble, sir?” he asked quietly.

The man handed him the homework assignment. It was covered in the professor’s favorite color of ink: red. “Harry, your homework usually isn’t the best, but this is even worse than normal. Would you care to explain to me why you didn’t put any effort at all into the assignment?”

“I was distracted,” the boy answered, looking down at his shoes. Uncle Sev had used that disappointed tone of voice that Harry hated so much.

“Distracted? Distracted by what?”

“Exploding Snap,” he admitted softly.

“You were playing before you had finished your homework?” Harry slowly nodded. “It will not happen again, young man. Is that clear?”

“Yes sir.”

Severus sighed. “I can not in good conscience give you a grade on that assignment that you turned in. However, if you redo the assignment, properly this time, I will give you half credit.”

“Thank you, Uncle Sev,” Harry replied, finally looking up at the man.

“Don’t thank me yet, Harry. It must be turned in by Friday or there will be no Quidditch game on Saturday.”

Harry’s face paled. “Oh, I’ll finish it!”

“See that you do. We’ll work on your study habits this summer. And tell your friends that you have detention with me on Saturday for the incomplete assignment. That will be our cover for the game.”

“Yes sir,” he said, giving the man a quick hug before scampering from the room and hurrying to his next class.

--

Saturday morning, Harry hurried down the stairs and let himself into Snape’s quarters. “Morning,” he chirped, heading over and settling down at the table where the professor and his brother were already eating breakfast.

“Good morning, Harry,” Severus told him. “Did you sleep well?”

“Yes sir. Umm…Uncle Sev?”

“What is it, Harry?”

“What are we going to do about the game? I mean…I can’t really go to a Quidditch game with you and Draco, can I?”

Severus smiled at him. “I was wondering when one of you would ask that. We will all be using glamour charms…charms that will change our appearances. If anyone asks you two are James and John Evans at the game with your Uncle Toby. By using our middle names, we aren’t really lying…”

“Just misleading them,” Draco finished with a sly smile. “Very Slytherin, Uncle Toby…”

Severus reached out and ruffled the boy’s hair. “I will remove the charm that Draco has been under the last twelve years and then we will decide where to go from there.”

Once they were finished eating, Draco stood. “I’m ready.” Even though he hid it, he was actually a little nervous about seeing his true appearance.

The man nodded and led the two boys into the bathroom so that they could watch the transformations in the mirror. “Are you sure you’re ready, dragon?”

The boy took a deep breath and nodded. “Let’s do it.”

Severus gestured with his wand and spoke softly in Latin. The three watched as Draco’s sharp aristocratic features softened. The white-blond hair became a dark red and grey eyes darkened to green.

Harry smiled. “You look like Mum.”

“It’s so different,” he said, running his fingers through the unruly mop that, except for the color, looked so much like his brother’s.

“Your turn, Harry,” Severus told him, waving his wand over Harry as well.

Harry’s black hair turned the exact shade as Draco’s and grew long enough to cover his scar completely. His eyes grew wide as his glasses disappeared, but his vision didn’t become blurry.

“No one can see your glasses, but they are still there,” Severus explained.

“That’s brilliant!”

Severus turned his wand on himself and uttered the incantation. As the two boys watched, his appearance changed to match that of Draco and Harry. A moment later he changed it back. “I will replace the charm once we are off the school grounds. You two will need to leave the castle under Harry’s cloak,” he told them, holding out his hand and summoning the invisibility cloak.

Draco hesitantly reached out and fingered the fabric. It was surprising soft and cool and silky. He had heard about Harry’s cloak before, but this was the first time he had been this close to it. “I’m ready,” he said, looking back up at his godfather.

Severus covered the two boys with the cloak and the three of them left the school grounds. Once outside the wards, Severus took the cloak from the boys, placing it in his pocket. He reapplied the glamour charm and with an arm around each boy, Apperated them to the site of the Quidditch game.

--

The next morning at breakfast, Fred and George sat where they could watch Harry as well as the second year Slytherins. The identical red heads were close together, something everyone at Hogwarts had quickly come to learn meant that two were plotting something. “What do you think Fred?” George asked his twin as they watched Harry stare at nothing in particular.

They both chuckled when Harry smiled. “He’s definitely communicating with someone, because watching Ron eat is nothing to smile at…now to figure out which of the little snakes he’s talking to…” Fred replied.

“It would help if we knew more about Harry’s family.”

They looked up when the owls flew into the hall to deliver the mail. “Hopefully Charlie got our letter and replied.” Sure enough an owl landed on the table in front of them. Fred took the letter while George gave the owl a bit of food. “What does it say?”

Greetings Rascal Weasleys,

“Remind me to hurt Charlie next time I see him,” George told his twin.

“Do you want to know what he says or not?” Fred asked.

“Oh…right. Go ahead.”

“Thank you,” Fred replied before continuing to read the letter.

I hope the two of you are staying out of trouble, but knowing you two I know that is a little too much to ask. Try not to give Snape and McGonagall too hard a time. And keep that runt Wood on his toes.

I’m really not sure how the two of you found out that Harry had a twin, as it wasn’t really talked about. I barely remember it myself, except that I do remember Lily coming over to talk to Mum while she was expecting. The fact was pretty much forgotten after James and Lily were killed.

Harry’s twin still alive and at Hogwarts? And a Slytherin no less? I don’t know where the two of you come up with your ideas sometimes, but I think this is the worst yet. If you two insist on following through with this crazy scheme here’s a few things to think about:

1 – Harry’s twin was a boy, so that rules out half of the Slytherins in his class.

2 – Look at who has birthdays around the same time as Harry. They would have had to have been born around the same time, because if a switch was made, it was made at St. Mungo’s. Orion Potter (gosh, I had to stop and really think about the name, it’s been so long) died the same day he was born.

3 – The person in question is probably an only child, or at least the only son. I would think only a really desperate wizard would stoop to switching babies like that.

4 – Would a Death Eater take one of the sons of the Potters when You-Know-Who was after the Potters? Or if he did take the baby like you two insist, did he even realize that the baby he took was a Potter?

If the last is true, be very careful boys. That information could be deadly for that unsuspecting kid. I suggest that you drop the subject, but I know that won’t stop you.

Tell Ron that Norbert is doing well. Did he tell you about Norbert? Aren’t you two supposed to be keeping the kid out of trouble? Well, I just hope that you do are doing a better job with Ginny. Give the princess a hug and kiss for me.

Charlie

“Well, George,” Fred said, folding the letter and sticking it into his pocket. “Do we give it up like Charlie suggests?”

George laughed. “And miss a whole afternoon in Snape’s private lab? Never!” George turned his gaze over to the Slytherins. “It’s not Crabbe or Goyle. Those two are just too dumb.”

“Zabini’s got an older sister at Beauxbatons, I think.”

“That just leaves Nott and Malfoy.”

“Malfoy! It’s got to be Malfoy.”

“Are you sure, Fred?”

“Just look at him.”

George looked over at the Slytherin table and sure enough Draco Malfoy was staring at nothing, though it wasn’t quite as obvious as Harry’s stare. Draco smirked and a moment later so did Harry. George looked at his twin and grinned. “Fred, I think I know where we are going to be this afternoon…”

An hour later they knocked on the door to Snape’s office, entering when he called. “Gentlemen…do you have some information for me?”

“Yes sir, we do,” George said, taking a seat.

He set aside his work. “Very well. Let’s have it.”

“Harry’s twin is Draco Malfoy,” Fred told him.

“Very good, gentlemen. How did you come to that conclusion?” Severus sat back in his chair and folded his hands, ready to listen to their reasoning.

Fred started first. “You told us that it was a Slytherin, so that eliminated the Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws.”

“Then we owled our brother Charlie,” George continued. “We asked him if he remembered anything about Harry being a twin, since we were too young to remember it ourselves. Charlie told us that he remembered there being a twin brother, but that the twin died. That eliminated the Slytherin girls.”

“From there it was easy,” Fred added. “Crabbe and Goyle are too dumb to be able to attempt it…after that Malfoy just made the most sense.”

Severus nodded, unable to find fault with their logic. “What about the rest of the assignment?”

“They are communicating. Spent all of breakfast doing so.”

“Harry had a hard time keeping his emotions off his face. He was excited about something.”

Severus shook his head. “I knew taking them to that Quidditch game was a mistake.”

“You should take them more often, sir,” Fred told him. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen Harry that happy.”

“I will keep that in mind, Mr. Weasley. Very well, you two may come back after lunch and use my lab.”

--

It had been a bad week!

First Quidditch had been cancelled for the rest of the school year when Hermione and a sixth year prefect had been found petrified near the library. Hermione! His best friend had been found with a mirror in her hand and neither he nor Ron could figure out what she had been doing with it.

That night the two of them had snuck out to Hagrid’s to ask the big man about what the diary had shown him. While down there the Minister of Magic came with some Aurors to take Hagrid to Azkaban. Lucius Malfoy had shown up as well to inform the Headmaster that the Board of Governors had decided to suspend him pending an investigation into the petrified students. He and Ron had been hidden under his invisibility cloak and as Hagrid was being taken away he had given them a cryptic message, telling them to follow the spiders.

So Ron and Harry had followed the spiders into the Forbidden Forest . Only the little spiders they had followed, led them to a colony of HUGE, man-eating spiders. Aragog, the patriarch of the colony had told them that Hagrid was not to blame for opening the Chamber and that Slytherin’s monster was something that spiders feared. They had gotten the information that they were after, but had barely escaped with their lives. If it hadn’t been for Mr. Weasley’s Ford Anglia coming to their rescue, then the two boys would have been spider food.

And if that wasn’t bad enough, they had been caught by Professor Snape while trying to sneak back into the castle. They had been subjected to a blistering lecture from the Potions Master and had been sentenced to a week’s worth of detentions with Filch!

Harry had tried to talk to his Uncle Sev several times during the last week, only for the man to tell him that he was too busy to talk to Harry. If ignoring him was his way of punishing Harry for his “Gryffindor stupidity”, then Harry would much rather the man turn him over his knee! Because as embarrassing as it was, and it was more embarrassing than painful, at least as soon as the spanking was over the man would hug him and let him know that he was forgiven. Being ignored was ten times worse than anything Uncle Vernon had ever done to him!

“I’m glad this was our last night of detention,” Ron said, pulling Harry from his thoughts on how bad the week had been.

Harry nodded. “Me too. Let’s go see ‘Mione before curfew.” He led his friend up to the Infirmary, where he perched on the edge of Hermione’s bed. “Hey, ‘Mione,” he said after a few minutes. “Professor Sprout says that the mandrakes will be old enough soon…and then Professor Snape can make the potion that will get you better.”

“What’s that in her hand, Harry?” Ron asked from the other side of the bed.

He looked down at the hand that he had been stroking. Tucked inside her fist was a piece of paper. Working slowly and carefully, he managed to pull the paper free. It was a page that she had torn from a book and he straightened out the page. His eyes quickly scanned the page. That’s it! “Come on, Ron! We’ve got to find one of the professors!” He jumped up and raced from the room.

Ron ran after him. “Harry! Stop and tell me what’s going on!”

Harry skidded to a stop and turned to his friend, showing him the page that Hermione had torn from the book. “I know what Slytherin’s monster is, Ron…and I don’t know why I didn’t think about it before! I read about it just before school started.”

“What are you talking about?” the red head asked, confused.

“It’s a basilisk! That’s why I’m the only one who can hear it. It’s a snake!”

Ron looked at the page. “It says that the basilisk’s stare is deadly. No one has died, Harry.”

Harry considered this for a moment. “It’s only deadly if you look it in the eye. Colin saw it through his camera…Justin through Nearly Headless Nick.”

“And Hermione and Penelope saw it through the mirror. They were using the mirror to look around corners! But how is something as big as a basilisk getting around the castle with no one seeing it?”

“Hermione answered that for us,” he replied, pointing to a word that their friend had scribbled on the bottom of the page. “It’s in the pipes.”

“That’s…that’s bloody brilliant.”

“I know,” Harry told him, turning to race down the hall again. “We need to find a professor.”

They ran down the halls, skidding to a stop a few corridors later as they noticed the professors that they sought stood with their backs turned at the other end of the hall. The two boys pressed their backs against the walls and slid closer to the group, hiding themselves in the shadows.

“A student has been taken,” Professor McGonagall was saying.

“Who?” asked one of the professors.

“Miss Ginny Weasley.”

“Ginny?!” Ron yelped, but Harry covered his friend’s mouth with his hand.

It was Snape who spoke next. “Well, Gilderoy…here’s the chance you’ve been waiting for all year.”

They couldn’t hear the Defense professor’s mumbling reply.

“We’ll leave you to it,” McGonagall told the man, as one by one the professors turned to leave.

As soon as they were gone, Harry moved his hand. Ron pointed to the wall, whimpering. Harry turned to look. Written in blood was another message.

Her body will lie in the Chamber forever.

“Harry…we gotta do something,” Ron told him.

“Lockhart’s going after her. We’ll go talk to him,” Harry said, grabbing Ron’s sleeve and pulling him toward Lockhart’s office.

--

Draco had been lying in his bed, preparing to go to sleep when he heard his brother’s voice through their bond. Startled, he sat up quickly. ‘Harry? What’s wrong?’

“Alright, Malfoy?” Nott asked, confused as to why the boy sat up so suddenly.

“Shut up,” Draco hissed, listening for Harry’s answer. ‘Harry?’

‘I think I really messed up this time…’

‘What have you done?’ he asked, ignoring the confused looks from his roommates.

‘Ron and I have Lockhart at wand point and we are going into the Chamber of Secrets…’

‘You what?!’

“Malfoy…” Blaise Zabini started.

“I said, shut up! I can’t hear!” Draco snapped at him.

The other occupants of the room stared at Draco in shock. Had the boy lost his mind?

‘Damn it, Harry! What are you going on about?’

‘Slytherin’s monster is a basilisk. It’s got Ginny. Lockhart was sent into the Chamber to get her, but the guy is a fraud!’

‘I could have told you that!’

‘DRACO!’

The blond winced at the volume of his twin’s voice through there bond. It had never been that loud before. ‘Not so loud…continue…’

‘Ron and I found out the truth and Lockhart threatened to erase our memories. So we had to disarm him. And we’re taking him into the Chamber with us.’

‘You have lost your mind!’

‘Just get Uncle Sev and tell him to find Moaning Myrtle.’

‘Who the hell is Moaning Myrtle?’

‘Damn it, Orion! Just do it!’

‘Right. Sorry.’ Draco jumped from his bed and raced out of the room, hoping none of the prefects were up in the common room to stop him.

“I think Malfoy has finally lost it,” Nott told the other three.