Dinner was very quiet, and no one ate much.
Ginny was inconsolable.
“Come on, you didn’t have a crush on Lockhart, too?”, Ron asked when silent tears started to roll down her cheeks after they’d returned to the common room.
“What? No! I – I just ... we were so nasty to Luna. What if – if she’s ...”
“I’m sure she will be fine”, Hermione said. “The professors are all looking for her.”
But Luna did not turn up the next day. Instead, there was writing on a wall. “Her skeleton will lie in the chamber forever.”
Shortly after that news had spread, Ron caught Ginny trying to sneak out of the common room.
“You have no chance against Slytherin’s monster! You’re a first year!”
“And? You were the same age when you went to fight You-Know-Who.”
Harry had to admit to that. It was strange how suddenly, Ginny seemed too young to try and rescue Luna, when they had thought themselves plenty old enough to protect the Philosopher’s Stone back then. “Yes but we didn’t go alone”, he pointed out.
“You can come”, Ginny said. “But don’t try to keep me back.”
“It’s no use arguing”, Hermione told Ron. “Trust me, I tried it with you and Harry when you wanted to duel Malfoy. Didn’t help any.”
And she stomped off after Ginny.
Harry and Ron looked at each other for a moment, then followed.
Ginny led them to Moaning Myrtle’s toilet.
“And now?”, Hermione asked.
“I don’t know”, Ginny had to admit. “I just ... I know it must be somewhere here.”
“Why?”
“Here’s where I often woke up after - It’s all my fault.” Ginny looked around. “It’s that diary. I threw it in a toilet, and - ”
“Oh, you did that!” Myrtle rose from one of the cabins. “You! Think it funny to throw things at me?”
“What? I didn’t throw anything at you!”
“Yes you did! I was just sitting there, pondering death, and suddenly - ” Myrtle cried ghostly tears, too upset to continue speaking.
“I just wanted to get rid of the diary! I had no idea you were in there!”
Before Ginny could explain more, Hermione interrupted her: “Listen, Myrtle, Luna Lovegood has vanished. Have you seen her?”
“She came here to cry. Because you called her Loony.” Myrtle pointed an accusing finger at Ginny. “And she was sorry that someone had thrown a diary at me!”
“Have you seen her after that?” Hermione insisted.
“I am not sure ... let me think ...”
“Did she take the diary?” Ginny wanted to know. “It was cursed, you know.”
“Cursed? You threw a cursed diary at me?” Myrtle seemed to prepare for another bout of crying, but then she thankfully hesitated. “Oh, I haven’t seen her, but I heard her. Yesterday. The bullies steal her shoes, and I heard someone walk through here on socks.” Myrtle frowned. “I didn’t hear the door again. She mumbled something to herself, but I couldn’t understand what, and then she was suddenly gone. Probably some magic that I never got to learn. Because I’m dead.”
“No way, you don’t learn to apparate until like sixth year or so.” Ron looked around. “Fred and George say there’s tons of secret passageways in Hogwarts. Refuse to tell me where they are, though.”
Hermione was already busy inspecting the washbasins. “There’s a snake etched into this tap. If that’s just a Slytherin showing house pride, it’s a weird place for that.”
“Let me see.” Harry stepped closer. “No, it really doesn’t look like vandalism.”
“The tap doesn’t work”, Hermione mused. “Perhaps the passageway is somehow hidden behind it?
They tried everything to trigger the mechanism to open it, from touching their wands to it to punching it – Ron regretted that one immediately - but the basin wouldn’t move.
“Oh, we are such idiots!”, Hermione said at last.
“Hey, speak for yourself!”
Ginny rolled her eyes. “Oh, shut up, Ron. Why are we being idiots?”
“We are looking for a secret chamber Salazar Slytherin built into the castle. Obviously, the way to open it would be something only his true heir can do – or at least something he thinks only his heir can do. Harry, you have to try using parseltongue.”
“How? When I talk to snakes, I just use regular English.”
“No, you don’t. I heard you in that pet shop”, Hermione stared at him. “Do you really not notice that you are, well, hissing when you talk to snakes?”
“What? No. I don’t think I ...” Was he? “Anyway, I can’t do it on purpose.”
“Perhaps if you look at that picture of a snake? Just try to imagine it is real?”
Just when Harry was about to try that, the door to the girls’ toilet opened.
“Potter. What part of ‘stay in your common room’ didn’t you understand?”
The next moment, everyone was talking at the same time. Ginny claimed it was her fault, Hermione and Ron defended Harry, and Moaning Myrtle complained that Snape had no business being in a GIRLS’ toilet, nevermind that Harry and Ron were there, too.
“No time to explain”, Harry said quickly when everyone had to catch their breath. “The entrance to the chamber of secrets must be somewhere here, sir. Please – we can’t waste any more time.”
Perhaps it was because he had seen Rose could reason with Snape – somehow he hoped the man would be reasonable. For once.
“Very well. Miss Warren, please do inform the headmaster that he will be needed here. You just might earn Ravenclaw some points.”
Myrtle floated off without complaint, which was nothing short of a miracle.
“Do proceed, Potter.”
It felt extremely silly to try and talk to a picture of a snake under Snape’s scrutinizing gaze, but Luna was in grave danger, if not dead already. They had to hurry.
Harry imagined, very hard, that the snake was real. “Open?”, he tried.
“You still talk English”, Hermione informed him. “Perhaps think of that snake in Paris?”
He tried again. “Please open the door”, he said.
This time, it worked. A pipe, large enough for a person to fit into, was revealed.
“Stay back”, Snape commanded. “You are to wait for the headmaster and tell him where I went.”
“I have to go!” Ginny insisted. “It’s all my fault she’s there! If I had told someone about the diary ...”
“What diary?”, Snape asked, distracted for a moment.
A moment Ginny used to climb into the pipe.
“Foolish girl!”
No matter how foolish he apparently thought what Ginny had done, Snape did the exact same.
“Harry, you should stay here, in case it closes again, you have to open it for Professor Dumbledore”, Hermione said.
“Hey, wait, you can’t - ”
Hermione climbed into the pipe and vanished.
“Sorry mate, but that’s my sister down there”, Ron said and followed suit.
Chapter 8