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The problem with pretending everything is fine is that eventually you get good enough at lying that you actually believe it. You grow up learning that the world is one way, and then one day a posh-looking letter slips through the mail slot and suddenly, all the rules have changed and nobody's waiting for you to catch up. You've got to learn on your feet, stay alert.

The point is not that Harry doesn't notice the other mums and dads at the platform hugging their children good-bye, because he does. The point is that Aunt Petunia is telling him to make her proud and Harry is scrambling to figure out how he's going to become a great wizard when he doesn't know how to write with a quill and he's still not sure how to hold his wand. The train is whistling too loudly and the crowd is pushing past too roughly and Harry feels like his life has not ceased it's breakneck pace for even a minute since the letter arrived—and Harry's not even at the school yet.

But Harry is going to make Aunt Petunia proud, so he shakes off the uncertainty like it was never there and buries the image of the other families' heartfelt goodbyes in the graveyard at the back of his mind. It's the place where he banishes everything he can't think about if he wants the world to continue making sense. Like how angry Aunt Petunia got when Dudley interrupted her explanation of the magical world to ask why she never told them before. It all goes into the graveyard, and the longer it stays there, the easier it is to pretend it never happened. He's fine.

The point is… Harry Potter is associated with a lot of graveyards.

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Harry Potter is not sure how he feels about Blaise Zabini.

For one thing, Harry is fairly sure that Zabini only hangs around Harry out of a desire to irritate Draco Malfoy. Zabini, Harry has determined after two months in the same House and classes and dorm with him, is very concerned about being either completely indifferent or completely contrary—sometimes both at once. So Zabini sticks to Harry like glue (or like a sticking charm? Is the idiom different in the wizarding world?) because Malfoy has decided for everyone in first year that Harry should be ignored unless he, Malfoy, deems otherwise. (Malfoy is, generally speaking, a prat, but that's a whole other dilemma.)

On the other hand, Zabini's kinda funny, and having him around means Harry doesn't have to work up the courage to ask someone to be his partner in classes. Furthermore, Zabini has lived in the wizarding world since birth: Harry can watch him for queues and learn how real wizards act. Really, now that Harry thinks about it, they both have selfish reasons for being almost-friends. Maybe it's a Slytherin thing, Harry decides. (Hmm… he'll have to see about giving Malfoy a selfish reason not to be a prat.)

Harry only considers Zabini an almost-friend because in all the books Harry devoured as a child a friend was someone who would stick by you through thick and thin—hell and high water—all the way to Mordor—to infinity and beyond… well, just, someone you could always depend on no matter what. Aunt Petunia always says people like that don't exist and why doesn't Harry try reading something more educational, like non-fiction? Maybe it's true, but Harry's still waiting for a friend to come along.

Back to Zabini, though. Harry almost feels like he should be taking notes, listing pros and cons. Pros: convenient, doesn't stare at Harry's scar. Cons: flighty, borrows Harry's textbooks and draws caricatures of the professors in the margins. Funny ones though.

But if Harry starts writing everything down he might as well buckle down and write that letter to Aunt Petunia he's been putting off. Aunt Petunia would know, certainly, what to make of Zabini. Aunt Petunia is a rock, awesome and imperturbable like Mt. Everest, and she always knows what to do. Harry wants to be just like her when he grows up—and well, maybe funny like Uncle Vernon, too. In order to get Aunt Petunia's opinion on Zabini, though, Harry first has to write to her about him—something that, despite his weekly letters home, Harry has consistently avoided doing.

Part of this is because Harry has the growing suspicion that Aunt Petunia would not approve of Zabini. He talks too loudly and extends his philosophy of indifferent contrariness (contrary indifference?) to their professors and to education in general, despite the House points it costs him. He draws on his arms with a sparkly magic quill he brought from home (it makes the doodles move!) and claims he's going to cover himself in tattoos when he grows up. Sometimes he wears skirts—the same pleated uniform ones the girls wear—instead of trousers and laughs at anyone who teases him about it. (Harry is personally burning with curiosity but considers it none of his business and doesn't ask.)

Another part of it is that Harry is not sure he could do anything to keep Zabini away if Aunt Petunia told him to do so (See: contrariness, above.) So Harry avoids the possible conflict by not writing home about Zabini, and keeping Zabini as much at arms length as he can.

That is, until the incident at Halloween.

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On the other hand, Harry knows exactly how he feels about Hermione Granger. It doesn't take sharing too many classes with her for Harry (and his whole year, atcually) to realize two things. One: Granger is very, very smart. Two: she is entirely too conscious of it.

Harry believes she's not really stuck-up; she's too friendly (really, seriously, too friendly, almost desperately so). She's very generous with her knowledge, offering help to everyone—even when they don't necessarily want it. That's the crux of the matter, Harry thinks. (He found the word crux in one of his textbooks last week and likes it quite a lot.) Granger doesn't know when and when not to open her mouth.

She's a loner in her own house; Harry almost never sees her with company—unless you counted books of course. She spends a lot of time in the library studying. She is, Harry thinks, kind of a lot like him in those respects. (Harry doesn't count his personal leech Zabini as company.) Harry has not been able to find any further signs of personality in Granger, though. She's not funny like Zabini; she's not really interesting at all. Certainly not someone Harry would consider 'friend' material. Harry knows, however, that Granger is someone Aunt Petunia would approve of in every single way, probably down to the way she organizes her things neatly on her desk before beginning to take notes, and Harry thinks she would make a good study partner.

As much as Harry would like to have a study partner who doesn't try to doodle on him with magic sparkly ink, not to mention a name to prove to Aunt Petunia that he is indeed socializing and adjusting well at Hogwarts, he does not approach Granger. This is because Granger is not only a Gryffindor but also some sort of wizarding untouchable—what the rest of the Slytherins call a "mudblood" in the same tone as Aunt Petunia says "that sort" when referring to the homeless folks who sleep in the park at the end of Privet Drive.

("Don't use that word, Harry," Blaise scolds lazily. "It's terribly common—Malfoy if you keep scowling your face will stick that way—and anyway, labeling someone with their blood status when they've got so many other traits to make fun of is just plain unoriginal.")

Harry doesn't much care about House rivalries or completely understand the wizarding obsession with bloodlines, but he doesn't want to associate with Granger if the price for doing so is waking up in the middle of the night to the wizarding version of a wet-willy or worse from the other boys in his dorm (Zabini included, probably, just for the fun of it). So Harry doesn't sit next to Granger in the library when he goes to study, and he writes her off as a somewhat dull could-have-been, nothing more.

That is, until the incident at Halloween.

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His Fame

Harry catches up to the wizarding world as quickly as he can. He's too shy to do anything but read on the train but that doesn't stop him from attracting attention from people who've heard that the famous Harry Potter is on board. Harry takes note: the Voldemort thing is a bigger deal than he previously thought. People stare at him. To be particular, they stare at his scar. Perhaps that's something he can use later?

Voldemort

The sorting is a source of a host of new information. Houses are very important social groups: Harry is sure there will be lots of related rules to learn for them. Also, mind-reading hats are a thing, which kind of creeps Harry out. Most importantly though: as big a deal the Voldemort thing is, being sorted into Slytherin is almost as bad. None of the other new Slytherins get the same shocked hush, and awkward, faltering applause that Harry receives, so he supposes the reaction must have something to do with the Voldemort thing. A lot of things seem to trace back to the Voldemort thing, which is frustrating because Harry has yet to get a thorough accounting of it. If only Aunt Petunia weren't a muggle, then she would know, and she'd tell Harry.

Quidditch

Quidditch is a wonderful, wonderful game. Harry's never really gone in for sports before—that's Dudley's forte—and it's not really the sport that captivates him now. It's the flying. He feels so free, weightless and uncatchable… It's a little ironic, he thinks, that riding a broomstick at reckless speeds and deadly heights should be so relaxing, but it is.

Aunt Petunia's reaction is mixed. Harry thought she was pleased, especially since in his letter explaining how he got on the Slytherin team he minimized the slight rule infraction and stressed the fact that he was going to be the youngest player in a century (and didn't mention at all that his real father had apparently played the game, too). Aunt Petunia even insists on buying him the most expensive broom on the market to help him play better, although she warned him not to let his grades slip even in the slightest. But when Harry gets permission to have his family come see his first game (Professor Snape is uncharacteristically accommodating: Harry takes care to ask him when Professor McGonagall is in earshot and able to fume jealously) Aunt Petunia says "maybe next time"—and on the third "maybe next time" Harry stops writing home about Quidditch.

Hagrid

Harry runs into Hagrid by accident. He took to doing his reading down by the lake early in the semester, fond of the quiet, and one day the giant squid ("WHYYYYY IS THERE A GIANT SQUID IN THE LAAAAKE!?!?!") snuck a tentacle through the strap on Harry's bag while he was engrossed in Hogwarts: A History and pulled it into the lake. Harry went chasing after it, and Hagrid appeared to drag him out of the water when Harry fell off a steep drop off along the bank. ("Yer gotta bring him a treat, the greedy lil thing, or 'e plays trick on ye.") From that point on, Harry either brings a sandwich from the Great Hall with him as a peace offering or takes Hagrid up on the invitation to stop by his cabin. The gameskeeper is kind-hearted and an incurable gossip, and Harry enjoys stopping by for tea (no rock-cakes), especially as the weather grows colder and studying by the lake is no longer comfortable. One look around the one-room habitation, however—with its hanging furs, cluttered shelves, greasy floor and slobbery dog—ensures that Harry is never breathing a word of his visits here to Aunt Petunia.

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"Troll—in the dungeons—thought you ought to know."

The moment Prof. Quirrell faints the entire Great Hall erupts into chaos; Harry winces at the sound of quite a few of his year-mates shrieking. He grips the edge of the table, his fingertips turning white. "Trolls are a thing, then?" he says, voice slightly higher that usual. Every time he thinks he's got this wizard thing handled, something comes along and bowls him over again.

Next to Harry, Zabini has begun seizing sticky deserts from the platters arrayed before them and stuffing them into several plastic bags with a determined haste. (Aunt Petunia packed a box of them in Harry's trunk and Zabini was so enchanted with them that Harry had gifted them to him.) Zabini answers without looking up from his work. "Yes, trolls are a thing. Huge, ugly, stupid blokes. Very mean."

Harry stared as Zabini switched from deserts to candies, stuffing them into his deep skirt pockets. "What are you doing?"

"Taking advantage of the situation."

Harry has already become well-acquainted with Zabini's prodigious appreciation for Hogwart's excellent food, as well as his equally prodigious sweet-tooth, but if this is his first reaction upon hearing that there was a troll in the castle, Harry thinks maybe Zabini needs to reconsider his priorities a bit. Now was not the time for contrariness or indifference.

"There's a troll in the castle, you know," Harry presses, just in case the other boy had somehow misunderstood.

"Yes, and who knows how long the feast will be delayed because of it?"

"Do you take anything seriously?"

Zabini turns to look Harry with wide, earnest eyes and Harry cannot tell if the expression is a mask or not. "Yes I do, Potter. Things like candy. Now help me out: I wanna steal that caramelized jack o'lantern."

Earlier that day the Slytherins and Gryffindors are leaving a Charms class in which Granger has been particularly "helpful" when she rushes past Harry, with her kinky locks and bag flying gracelessly behind her, and leaving whispers in her trail. Harry can hear "mudblood", "know-it-all" and "nightmare" among them.

Blaise turns to Harry. "Pinch me, I'm dreaming."

"Why?"

Blaise gestures discretely with his chin at the red-headed Gryffindor who's just accused Granger of being a nightmare. "Because I just agreed with a Weasely. Miss Leviosaaah was a right headache today. "

Harry frowns, uncomfortable. "They don't have to make a big deal about it though… I think she was crying."

"So? Maybe she'll learn some tact, if that's possible for a Gryffindor."

Harry raises an eyebrow at Zabini, who currently has a very rude sonnet about Professor Flitwick dancing down the olive skin of his left arm in sparling ink. The good-natured professor had been impressed by its 'iambic pentameter' (Ravenclaws and their trivia, Harry thought) and so Zabini only lost Slytherin twenty points instead of thirty.

"You," Harry says emphatically, "should not be saying anything about tact."

Harry and Zabini are already lagging behind the mass of Slytherins and Hufflepuffs headed for the Infirmary on the third floor (as sending them all downstairs in the direction of the troll was deemed unwise by their heads of houses), each with pockets and bags loaded with stolen bits of feast and arms laden with a large carmelized jack o'lantern that takes both of them to carry (and is getting heavier every minute), when they reach one of the staircases with a trick-step. Everyone else stumbles through it (or leaps over it, as memory and dexterity permit), eager to get as far away from the dungeons as possible.

Harry and Zabini stagger to a stop. The jack o'lantern snaps its teeth and leers at them. "We're never gonna hop the gap with this thing…" Harry says.

Zabini huffs, but can't deny the truth. "We're not leaving it behind after all the trouble of nicking the thing. And we'll be kings of the common room when we manage to bring it back."

Harry bites his lip. He has to admit that after lugging it this far, he doesn't want to leave the warm, delicious smelling dessert behind, either. And their plan to deny Malfoy any of the spoils when sharing in the common room holds it own allure, as well. "Could we stash it somewhere and come back later?"

Zabini's eyes light up. "There's a girls' bathroom on this floor that nobody ever uses! We can hide it there."

At the mention of the girls' loo, Harry forgets all about the jack o'lantern. His mind jumps immediately to a piece of information he's picked up from always keeping one ear on the rumor mill. His mind is always alert like that, ceaselessly grinding facts and observations together until something catches that could be useful or dangerous. This particular conclusion definitely lands in the 'danger' category.

"Granger doesn't know about the troll," he says, mind already rushing to work out the implications this could have.

"What?"

"Granger. She spent the whole afternoon in the bathroom off the Great Hall crying, and she wasn't at the feast. Pansy was gossiping about it before Quirrell showed up." Harry explains, seized with a sense of urgency. He doesn't know why he feels it: he is not in danger, after all. Yet. "We have to go get her."

Zabini blinks, glances down at the jack o'lantern between them, then back up at Harry. "What about the—"

"Blaise!" Harry shocks both Blaise and himself into silence—more with the use of Blaise's first name than the sharp tone. Harry's impatient; his whole psyche is screaming that he has to do something before it's too late and everything is his fault. If the troll gets the Granger girl and Harry knew in time to save her… Harry takes a bit of a breath and continues more softly. "She could be in danger."

"So you're gonna go charge in and rescue her? Are you some kind of Gryffindor now?"

Harry looks at Blaise sternly. "I'm dropping my side of the pumpkin in three counts. One."

"Come on! I'm sure the teachers will take care of it."

Harry almost snorts. He doesn't trust the teachers with something like this. Aunt Petunia always says that if you want something done you should do it yourself. "The same teachers who didn't notice us steal a jack o'lantern and carry it out of the Great Hall? Two."

Blaise gestures upstairs as best he can with no free hands. "We're supposed to be with the other Slytherins—you know, the people who don't help Gryffindors or rush into danger like headless chickens?"

"Since when do you care about what you're supposed to do?" Harry challenges.

Blaise frowns, elegant eyebrows knitting together momentarily as he considers this. Then they release their tension with an equally elegant little shrug, and Blaise drops the pumpkin, surprising Harry. It shatters into several chunks and splatters globs of caramel and pumpkin-flesh on their robes.

"Fair enough," is all Blaise says in explanation. He gestures back down the corridor towards the Great Hall. "Lead on." He pauses, considering, then adds: "…Harry."

"Who knew Miss Leviosah has been a Slytherin this whole time!" Blaise whispers ecstatically later that night in the dorm showers. Blaise evidently enjoys an adrenaline high as much as a sugar rush, and Harry—who decidedly does not enjoy either one—is tempted to mention what a Gryffindor-ish trait it is. Instead he just sighs into the hot water steaming through his shower stall and continues rubbing shampoo into the congealed mix of squashed candy and troll boogeys in his hair.

"Lying does not automatically make someone a Slytherin, you know."

Blaise snorts from the other stall. "Don't tell me you didn't notice the way she played McGonagall. Had the old cat wrapped around her finger with a splash of tears and a pinch of noble self-sacrifice. Bloody brilliant manipulator that girl is, all hidden behind the goody-two-shoes frown and the anxious hair."

"Snape didn't believe a word of it," Harry warns. The suspicion in their Head of House's eyes had been plain.

Blaise's tone gorws slightly uneasy, although Harry knows Blaise doesn't share his reservations or fears concerning the taciturn professor. They're both scheduled to meet with him—separately—on Monday night after classes to "discuss the incident".

"Well, you know, she doesn't have any proper training, and she is a Gryffindor. In her place I probably would've claimed the two of us lured her in there for a laugh. That would be more plausible. Besides, it takes more than verve and talent to pull a fast one on Snape. The man can probably read minds."

"What—" Harry begins flatly, terrified that actual people in the wizarding world might have the same unsettling ability the Sorting Hat does.

"Joking! I'm joking," Blaise corrects quickly, accustomed to Harry's anxieties. "…although now that I think about it…"

Harry slaps his hands on the tiled wall between them. "Zabini! Don't do this to me! You do realize we still have to explain ourselves on Monday? He's gonna see right through us!" Now that Harry has allowed his brain to predict unpleasant possibilities, he suddenly finds he can't stop: "And he'll probably tell Filch we were the ones who smashed the pumpkin on the staircase. What if we get expelled?!"

It's only been two months and already Harry can not imagine going back home and never returning to Hogwarts. Aunt Petunia would be so disappointed I him. Oh no, what is he supposed to say in his next letter? How do you explain a mountain troll to your muggle moth—your muggle aunt? "Aunt Petunia's gonna be so mad," Harry groans, pressing the heels of his palms into his eye sockets.

A brief touch on his shoulder jerks Harry back to the present. Blaise's soapy head is poked around the shower wall, looking surprisingly earnest. "Don't worry. We're not getting expelled. Snape can't read minds, or else he would've caught the Weasely Twins for mailing him that firecracker at breakfast last week. Mrs. Norris and Filch are probably having a right jolly party licking the pumpkin off the flagstones together, and your aunt…" Blaise's shrug is somehow visible despite his shoulders being out of sight. "You just took on a slimy smelly mountain troll. What can she do that could possibly be worse?"

A lot, Harry thinks. The things that come to mind don't actually sound as bad as they are, though, so he keeps them to himself and nods. Blaise retreats back to his stall. Harry does feel a little better, he realizes, although the sentiment seems to have more to do with Blaise himself than his overconfident reassurances. Harry feels a smile tug at the corner of his mouth as flashes of the evening replay in his mind: Blaise dropping the pumpkin and following him into danger, Blaise throwing fistfuls of candy at the troll to distract it--even Hermione snatching Blaise's wand away from him to charm the troll's club because Blaise still could not get "leviosaaahh" right…

"Hey Za—Blaise. We're… friends, right?"

Blaise's head swings back around the corner and he quirks at eyebrow at Harry. "Obviously."

The grin hiding in Harry's cheeks blooms brilliantly. A real friend. This is a momentous occasion. Thinking for a moment about how he should commemorate it, Harry immediately decides on something to reflect the true spirit of their relationship. "Well then you should know, that as your concerned friend, I asked Granger to come study with us. It's pretty clear your 'leviosa' needs work."

"WHAT?!"

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The problem with pretending everything is fine is that you never make a move to defend yourself. You're just trying to survive and keep out of the way, but somehow things still end up being your fault. You're the world's scapegoat and you don't question it. Nobody ever taught you otherwise.

The point is not that Aunt Petunia doesn't lift a finger to stop Dudley and Harry from taking out a year's worth of separation anxiety on each other in increasingly vicious ways—two upset pre-teen boys can't be expected to talk through negative issues without adult's guidance. "Why can't you be more like your cousin?" becomes the newest version of "Why can't you show a little more responsibility?" Put this away, keep that straight, no rude questions, no mistakes, be good. All Harry knows is that Dudley hates him now, and the relief he expected to feel upon arriving home for the summer hasn't come.

The point is not that Harry has no proof that Dobby is the one who dropped a cake on Uncle Vernon's Important Business Prospect's Wife's Head—because Aunt Petunia decides that he did it. Harry and Dudley were both grounded after yet another fight got on Vernon's nerves, and Harry can see why the cake would look like a vengeful prank that hit an unintended recipient. So he sends his anger to the graveyard and admits to making everything up.

The point is not that Dobby stole all Harry's letters from Blaise and Hermione—because Harry didn't expect any letters in the first place. Harry doesn't write any himself; Aunt Petunia would want to read them before letting him use Drillbit, the "family" owl. (He's Petunia's owl.) When he arrives at Hogwarts for his second year, Harry is jaded by Dudley's betrayal and frightened by Dobby's warnings; he pushes his two almost-friends away because it's easier to continue thinking they forgot all about him. That way, things (Harry) will be consistent (alone) and the world will make sense. Soon the "Heir of Slytherin" chaos provides enough distraction to make it easier to exile his guilt to the graveyard. He wishes he could send the whole last year to the graveyard.

The point is… Aunt Petunia is right about the world being cruel.

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Draco Malfoy may be a huge prat, and making an even bigger prat of himself running his mouth about this heir of Slytherin business, but from an objective perspective, Harry has to admit he's a good son. Malfoy talks about his father almost as much as Harry talks about Aunt Petunia. (This, in fact, is a point of contention between them, since every time Malfoy insists that a muggle woman couldn't possibly be all that wonderful, Harry hexes him with the boils jinx Hermione taught him last year.) He and Malfoy even end up seeing each other in the owlery every Sunday; it takes Harry a bit to realize Draco sends home weekly letters, too.

Harry has not yet found a selfish reason for Malfoy to stop being a prat, but the antipathy from last year has lessened somewhat anyway. Malfoy buys his way onto the Slytherin quidditch team with a set of Nimbus 2002 racing brooms, even one for Harry—"strictly so you won't embarrass us, Potter"—and it seems that during practice and matches Malfoy can bring himself to forget that Harry is Harry and Harry can forget that Malfoy makes fun of Blaise's skirts. Harry's contribution to Slytherin's house cup last year may have softened Malfoy up a little, as well.

Malfoy rolls his eyes when Harry sheepishly passes on the thank-you card Aunt Petunia insisted on writing for him when she looked up the price of Harry's new broom and realized how wealthy the Malfoys were. ("It's never too early to start making the right sort of friends, Harry.")

"My father does not receive muggle correspondence, Potter," Malfoy sneers. "Does your aunt write all your cards for you, then? Too famous to answer your fan mail yourself?"

Harry begins to sneer right back at Malfoy, but then an idea occurs to him. A Slytherin idea. "I can write my own letters, but Aunt Petunia thought a gift from someone like your father should receive a proper card, hand-written, hand-delivered, like proper folk do." Harry says the word proper with the same important tone Aunt Petunia uses, and watches Malfoy preen slightly at the implied compliment to his father. "I guess I'll just send it back. It's a pity now she'll think wizards don't have any manners."

"Oh, give it here," Malfoy snaps and snatches the card. He opens it and peruses the careful script and expensive stationery. "Well, I guess muggles aren't completely devoid of culture." Harry manages to hold his tongue, and Malfoy drags them both back to the dorm, where he over-graciously allows Harry borrow some blank stationery to write Aunt Petunia's card over, this time from Harry Potter. Then Malfoy writes a gorgeous a letter back to Aunt Petunia and signs it "Lucius Malfoy" and follows with a long list of titles Harry is pretty sure Aunt Petunia will not recognize but be impressed by anyway. The letter is penned on official Malfoy stationery, and the family crest appears as a shimmering watermark that moves to wherever on the page the reader's eye is. (Kind of showy, in Harry's opinion, but impressive nonetheless.)

"Will she be able to read it?" Harry asks, worried about the magical paper.

Malfoy waves a hand dismissively. "Oh certainly. That's not the paper we use for important correspondence." Harry unwisely asks how many different kinds of paper a wizard could possibly need, and Malfoy responds with passionate, righteous lecture about it that Harry only escapes when they realize they are both ten minutes late for potions class.

At Christmas, Malfoy sends Harry a wizarding stationers' catalogue, with at least a dozen products marked as crucial for someone of Harry's blood status and social significance, and a note to "please refrain from replying until you've purchased the proper paper to do so."

So… still a prat, but, you know, tolerable.

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The Petrifications

There's a betting pool in the Slytherin common room concerning who is behind it all. Harry doesn't know who started the betting pool any more than he knows who is behind the petrifications, but the disillusionment charm that appears on it any time Professor Snape makes a dormitory inspection causes Harry assume it was an older student. It's mostly a joke, but one that everyone in Slytherin is in on, whether for a knut or a galleon. The suspects range from calculated to ridiculous—Harry doesn't know who Professor Trelawney is, but the older students cackle every time someone adds a sickle to her name.

Harry's own name is up there in what seems to be complete seriousness given the number of galleons next to it, something which annoys Malfoy almost as much as the fact that his name is not up there. Malfoy even demands that everyone in their year make a bet, perhaps hoping someone will nominate him, but his plans are ruined by none other than Crabbe and Goyle. What motivation the two of them have for nominating "the Dark Lord", Harry can't begin to guess, but there it is. Blaise finds this hilarious, and in typical Blaise fashion proceeds to nag the rest of them into joining in—even Malfoy, determined to save face by betting so much on Voldemort that the total exceeds Harry's.

Parseltongue

Harry is pretty sure Aunt Petunia would object to him dueling, but goes anyway just to watch. Unfortunately, Lockhart is teaching, so Harry ends up bartering with a highly amused Millicent Bulstrode to let him hide behind her in exchange for help with her potions homework. This gives him front row seats to the catastrophe that is pairing Malfoy and Blaise together for a duel: Malfoy has been particularly vicious since Christmas and Blaise doesn't follow the rules on a good day.

It very quickly becomes not a good day.

Malfoy calls attention to Blaise's skirt and seems to get mixed up about whether he wants to tease Blaise for acting like a girl or accuse him of having a crush on Hermione—the jumbled insult is plenty enough to rankle Blaise, however, who snaps out a spell Harry's never heard before. It turns out that Blaise has not actually mastered Serpensortia yet: the large aggressive snake he summoned almost immediately becomes distracted by the crowd around it. Lockhart is useless, Malfoy is shocked, Snape is on the other side of the hall dealing with the older students, and the snake is far too close to the Huffelpuff boy for comfort. Harry jumps out from behind Millicent and tells the snake to stay away from Finch-Fletchley with the same stern tone he uses to get garden snakes out of Aunt Petunia's roses when he's pruning them.

In terms of how much it makes people talk about Harry, the parseltongue thing is apparently on par with the Voldemort thing. Also, Harry's score on the Slytherin betting pool goes up by forty galleons overnight.

Riddle's Diary

Harry has taken to hiding from people in Moaning Myrtle's bathroom. He, Blaise and Hermione used it to plot about the Sorcerer's Stone last year, but this year Harry's the only one who frequents it—or not, since technically someone stopped by long enough to throw an empty diary at Myrtle and leave. Harry's never kept a diary before…

Tom Riddle is so perfect. He's easy to talk to, and he gives Harry tantalizing bits of information about anything Harry can think to ask about, even the Chamber of Secrets! For days Harry walks around, quill in hand and nose in the diary, oblivious to the looks he collects (one specific, panicked look in particular). Riddle is always interested to hear about what Harry's been doing, although he's a little pushy when it comes to hearing about the Voldemort thing. Harry really doesn't know much, he insists, his parents are muggles, see—and then Riddle demands a whole explanation of that, and Harry ends up talking all about his wonderful, awesome Aunt Petunia. After three pages of it, Riddle evidently grows bored.

Yes, I'm sure she's lovely, for a muggle. I want to hear about your real mother.

—and that, that is what makes Harry close the diary. He barely even notices that it's been nicked from his bag in the quidditch lockers while he's in the hospital wing after the stupid house-elf sends the bludger for him. In fact, Harry only remembers it at all when he meets Blaise in the hospital wing after hearing about Hermione. Blaise is not pleased to see Harry, to say the least.

"Now is when you finally decide to show up? While you've been palling around with Malfoy, we've been searching for clues every free minute. I don't let her out of my sight all semester, and the one time I let her go to library alone… If you weren't busy being a prat, you could have been watching her!"

"Blaise, I… I may have a clue about who did it."

Chapter Text

"Got your homework," Millicent says as she heaves herself up on the foot of Harry's hospital bed. She's been Harry's study mate this year, since Blaise and Hermione—well, Harry doesn't want to think about Hermione until Madame Pomfrey and Professor Snape finish the mandrake draught, and since Blaise is still mad at Harry despite coming down into the Chamber with him… He'll write to them this summer, Harry suddenly decides, even if he'll have to send Hermione's through the post office and ask her to please please please forward Blaise's letters with her own owl. He really doesn't want Aunt Petunia reading the apologies he'll have to write. There's too much he'd have to explain.

To avoid glancing several beds down, Harry asks: "I thought exams were canceled."

Millicent shrugs. "Had to tell Pomfrey something to get in here, what with all the parents running around. When are yours showing up?"

Harry purposefully doesn't look at the muggle envelope sitting at his bedside table. It's short and curt and the longest sentence in it is: "When you get home, we are going to have a family talk." His fingers toy with the edge of his bedsheet absently. "Tomorrow, I think." It's easier to lie than to explain. "It's, uh, harder to get muggles here."

This gets an understanding nod from Millicent. She's always easy to lie to; Harry sometimes wonders why she's in Slytherin. She's also not much for talking, so Harry knows that he's responsible for the conversation despite Millicent being the one to visit him. "Thanks for visiting me, but really I'm fine." (He has told this multiple times to Madame Pomfrey, to no avail.)

"Well I guess I'll keep these chocolate frogs to myself, then," she says, drawing one out of her bag and waving it out of his reach. 

"Nevermind, I'm deathly ill. One foot in the grave." This and some excessive, dramatic coughing earns Harry a frog.

"Anyway, Potter, spill. Rumor has it Zabini saved the school"—Harry blinks, and Millicent grins at him, chocolate on her teeth—"…from Lockhart."

Harry tells Millicent about the wonders of Blaise's deep-pocketed skirts and the spare wand his mother sent him when he wrote home about the attacks ("I already know about skirts, Potter." "Oh, yeah…")—and how Lockhart was a total fraud ("You didn't already know that?" "Hush, I'm telling the story!")—and about the spiders and the Chamber ("You asked for help and the headmaster sent you the Sorting Hat?" "Yes, but a sword came out of it, and then—") and the basilisk and the diary and Riddle ("Wait, are you telling me it really was the Dark Lord? Potter, we won the bet!"). It's not an organized tale, and Harry has to keep backtracking to explain things like how he knew Fawkes was Dumbledore's phoenix and how he met Moaning Myrtle. The latter almost requires an entire retelling of last year's adventure with the Sorceror's Stone, but Millicent mercifully lets Harry off with a promise to tell her later.

When Harry finally gets to the very end and recounts how Lucius Malfoy stormed into Dumbledore's office with Dobby, Millicent can barely contain her laughter. "You freed a Malfoy house elf! You freed Draco's old house elf! And then it jinxed his father! Oh, I can't breathe, this is too much…"

"Wait, what? Dobby used to belong to Malf—uh, Draco?"

"Yes. Draco used to complain about him all the time, how he was obnoxious, how his father should get him a proper house elf, how he'd tell the elf to fetch him something impossible just to get him out of the manor for a while—ooh, I'll bet Draco's going to regret giving him so much free time now."

Harry is busy thinking about poor Dobby no doubt bludgeoning himself with a lamp every time Malfoy sent him for "something impossible"—Harry is definitely sending Dobby all of the odd socks in the house when he gets home—so it takes a moment to put together the bit about Malfoy. "You think he's gonna get in trouble?" Harry asks.

Millicent rolls her eyes. "Of course. Everyone knows Draco's father is awful to him. Making him write all those letters home, working him over for little mistakes and things he can't control, barring him from social events if his grades aren't perfect."

Harry frowns. None of that seemed strange to him. Lucius Malfoy was undoubtedly an awful person (Harry could see now why Draco was such a prat), but when it came to Draco, Harry thought he was… Well, when Harry overheard Draco getting scolded at Christmas, he sounded like a normal parent. The elder Malfoy certainly hadn't said anything Aunt Petunia wouldn't say. Harry just can't seem to reconcile his experiences with what Millicent is saying.

"But Malfoy is always talking about how great his father is," he protests.

Millicent shrugs, "He's lying? Or maybe he slipped in a pile of all those galleons when he was little, hit his head, and is permanently confunded. Who cares?"

Millicent continues on with her assessment of Harry's adventure, for once able to carry the conversation all by herself. It's a good thing, too, because Harry can't seem to concentrate, his mind repeatedly drifting back to the words: "Everyone knows Draco's father is awful to him."

And when he asks around, discreetly, before everyone finally leaves for home, people confirm what Millicent said.

Everyone knows Draco's father is awful to him.