I don't boast to be a good writer. I write for my own enjoyment, and merely hope that others may also enjoy my work. I know however, my style of writing will not be to everyone's taste, and ask that all those who read it be gentle. Sorry if it's dreadful. lol
Set
during the Gryffindor trio's 6th year
hiss.
Hermione rolled over in her bed.
hiss hiss
Hermione
groaned and sat up.
Groggily she blinked, trying to clear the
sleep from her eyes. She had been in the midst of taking her NEWTS in
her dream, when suddenly her test paper had started hissing at her.
Odd. Very odd.
But then, there was nothing normal about
Hermione Granger's life. The only child of two dentists, the Granger
family had been in the midst of their breakfast's on their back
porch one Saturday morning, basking in the warmth of the sun when her
Hogwarts letter had fallen directly from the beak of a snowy white
owl and into her lap.
hisssssss hissssss hissssssss. She
froze. What was that.
Hermione felt, for the first time since
wakening the slight indentation of weight at the bottom end of her
coverlet. She reluctantly shifted the direction of her gaze.
Oh.
Holy. God.
Positioned in the previously mentioned location was
a huge snake.
Immediately to dull the sheer unadulterated
terror suddenly pounding through her veins, Hermione switched her
brain into have-memorized-every- book-ever-printed mode.
Right.
We have a stout-bodied, broad-headed, roughly 2.5-meter long snake
with long fangs.
A Viper. The answer leapt out at her
immediately, followed by a dribble of further information, none of
which assisted in quelling her fears.
Viper. A venomous snake
belonging to the family Viperidae, which consists of roughly 150
species. A snake possessed of long erectile fangs, which are folded
back when not in use. They vary from 0.3 to 3 meters long. Vipers
feed on small animals, which are injected with their venom and then
trailed until they die. Most give birth to live young. Old world
vipers belonging to the subfamily Viperinae are generally ground
dwelling, although some are burrowers and some arboreal. New world
vipers belong to the subfamily Crotalinae and are known as pit
vipers, due to having a sensory pit between the eye and nostril used
to detect the tiny changes in temperature caused by warm-blooded prey
nearby.
hisssssssssssssssssssss.
The long drawn out 'S' almost seemed to imply impatience. Impertinent thing.
hisss. hisss.
Warily
Hermione looked directly into the viper's beady black eyes.
"What?" She whispered, feeling thoroughly stupid. "D-do
you want something?"
hissss.
"Was that a yes?"
hisss.
"Ummm, goodness, where's Harry when you need him..." Silently, the snake slid from the bed, to the carpeted floor and proceeded to slither to the door. Once there, it turned its beady eyes to her. hissssssss.
It jerked its head. Hermione could have sworn it was indicating something to her...
'perhaps it wants me to follow it' she thought
Almost as if sensing her thoughts, the Viper gave a loud hiss.
"Why
do I get the feeling that this is a bad idea..." Hermione said
as she got up and grabbed her black robe, which she had neatly draped
over the back of a chair. She slid her arms into the sleeves and
buttoned it up, leaving the top few buttons undone.
A very
faint sounding part of her brain whispered that, perhaps she should
leave a note for Ron and Harry. She gave an unlady-like snort.
'Saying what Hermione?' an inner voice mocked, "Hey Harry and
Ron, Don't worry if you can't find me. I'm following a poisonous
snake down the hall" ????? 'Well, that would certainly go down
well'.
She slipped her feet into a pair of shoes. With a
rather dramatic turn, the Viper proceeded to slither out the door and
into the corridor, down the stairs, into the common room and over to
the hole in the wall that served as the entrance to the Gryffindor
dormitories. Hermione pushed the portrait door open, dimly she heard
the end of a snore and a sharp intake of breath from the Fat Lady
"Passw- ahhhh!" she had obviously noticed the viper. The
Viper gave a great hiss and the Fat Lady went quiet, but glared
disapprovingly at Hermione. Dimly she couldn't help thinking that
there was something decidedly wrong about this situation. Why on
earth was she actually following the snake, it seemed such a stupid
thing to do. And yet, even as she thought this, her feet took her
forward as she followed the snake further into the dark, silent
school.
End
of part one
The air was damp and cold on her
face, and she shivered as she stepped off one of the many moving
staircases, and back onto the main floor of the school.
The
viper sped quickly along the ground, not a single sound made in the
course of its movement.
It turned suddenly, it's beady eyes
boring into hers, as if it could tell exactly what form her thoughts
were taking.
It was a dangerous time she lived in, especially for a muggle-born, or mudblood as a certain blonde Slytherin so charmingly put it. Snakes didn't just appear in your room wanting you to follow them. True, she couldn't prove for certain that was what it wanted, she wasn't a parselmouth after all, but somehow, she just knew.
And yet, even as these doubts sprouted in the garden of her mind, like ivy, spreading and taking over everything, her feet refused to stop. They kept moving forward, one after the other. Left, right, left right, further and further following the viper as it slithered toward it destination.
Left, right. Left, right.
Slither, slither. Slither, slither.
Further and further into the darkness.
They rounded another corner, the viper and the muggleborn. It was pitch black, Hermione could no longer see the snake, but she knew it was there, two or three paces ahead of her.
Her breath was coming in short shallow pants; she could feel dampness on her forehead and the small of her back where fear oozed from her pores.
Left, right. Left, right.
Slither, slither. Slither, slither.
Further yet into the darkness they went.
Hermione prayed for her feet to stop, when suddenly, remarkably they did. She almost cried in relief. Her feet were working! she could turn around and go ba-
No.
No, they weren't working. They were still under some kind of thrall from the snake.
Her hand reached forward into the darkness against her will.
'No' her mind pleaded. 'Stop, please don't.'
But her body wouldn't listen.
Her hand- the hand the snake seemed to control hand grasped something cold and hard.
'A doorhandle' her mind dimly registered, before her hand turned it, and pushed.
The door opened with a creak. Hermione and the snake entered the blackness. She heard the door close behind them.
hisss.
Suddenly, there was light. She could see!
She could see... the girl's toilet. Moaning Myrtles toilet.
'What on Earth?' The snake was standing in front of one of the sinks. Hermione could see herself in the mirror- the pupils of her chocolate iris dilated in terror.
She had changed a great deal. Almost 16, sweet sixteen. Her hair flowed just past her shoulders in curly brown and golden waves, slightly tousled from her sleep. Her red, pouting lips pursed in concentration. Unknown to her, she had become one of Hogwarts finest beauties.
One thing about her had not changed. She was still one of the finest minds ever to grace the halls of Hogwarts. There hadn't been a student of her intellect in over 50 years. And before that, the only souls recorded to possess such intellect were Salazar Slytherin and Isabella Gryffindor, Godric's younger sibling. It was no surprise to Hermione, after having read the information about Slazar's I.Q that the star pupil of 1948 was Salazar Slytherin's descendant. Tom Riddle.
Hermione's gaze drifted across the mirror above the sink, not observing the reflection, but merely the glass. Her gaze dropped lower to the tiles below the mirror, and further still to the tap and then the sink.
In her peripheral vision she had noticed a mark on the side of the tap that she had never seen before.
Her eyes flew up to the spout of the tap and focused intently.
There.
On the side of the tap was the symbol of a snake.
She had a feeling that she knew what this was, but wished fervently that she was wrong.
Harry and Ron had reluctantly told her of the events in their second year surrounding the Chamber of Secrets.
She knew they had found the entrance, but, due to being sworn to secrecy by Dumbledore, they had never divulged where exactly the said entrance lay.
It looked like she too had found it.
The snake began to hiss rapidly.
A flash of green light and the sink, tap, tiles and mirror moved aside to reveal an opening.
An opening to Salazar Slytherin's Chamber of Secrets.
End
of part two
Hermione slid down to the bottom
floor from the bathroom above. The skeletons of mice covered the
floor.
hiss.
The snake was still there.
Unbidden,
Hermione's feet started to move forward, confidently, weaving around
the bones as if she knew the clear path by heart.
At length,
her feet came to a stop.
Hermione's eyes flew around her
surroundings, taking in every detail.
In front of her, was a
large silver door. It looked much like the door to vaults that the
muggle banks were so fond of, except for the snakes, which were
intricately carved with little scales and beady eyes.
Again
the snake began to hiss, and as it did, the ornamental snakes began
to move, around and around the perimeter of the
door.
Crank.
Crank.
Crank.
As each snake
moved around a loud noise resounded, sounding as if large locks were
being opened...
crank.
The vault-like door gave way to
an entrance.
Hermione's tour guide, the viper slid confidently
inside. Hermione's feet followed.
Holy Merlin on a
broomstick.
Whatever Hermione had been expecting, it certainly
wasn't this. Large statues of snakes' heads lined the sides of the
great hall-like room inside the chamber. They were surrounded by
water, which created the feel of a moat surrounding a great
castle.
A path led further into the chamber, and split the
"moat" in half.
Hermione walked up the path, and
deeper into the chamber. Further still her feet commanded her,
weaving through long, dark corridors. Turn left. Straight ahead. Turn
right. Straight ahead.
Finally Hermione turned right into a
corridor, and her surroundings changed. No longer was the corridor
dank and decrepit, instead the walls were covered in engravings of a
most beautiful and mesmerizing nature.
Chandeliers hung from
the roof and provided a soft, glowing lighting.
At the end of
the corridor was a door made of oak. Its handle was gold and
encrusted with rubies. Dimly Hermione noted that these were
Gyrffindor colours- her favourites. But the thought was soon
forgotten as she reached out and turned the handle.
The door
swung open noiselessly and Hermione found herself in the most richly
decorated and furnished room she had ever seen. It's finery and
beauty was almost beyond comprehension.
The room was decorated
in a rich burgundy and dark green. With touches of gold and silver
here and there.
The bed was the largest Hermione had ever
seen, and also the most inviting. She was so tired, so utterly
exhausted that it seemed completely natural for her to pull back the
red and green coverlet with it's silver and gold tassels.
Had
she not felt so drowsy she would have undoubtedly noticed the fact
that the colour scheme seemed to be a mix of both Gryffindor and
Slytherin. She would also have undoubtedly found this very curious
and wondered why on earth Salazar Slytherin, who had despised Godric
Gryffindor would choose to decorate a room in his chamber in such a
manner.
As it was however, Hermione could barely keep her eyes
open. It was not beyond her to notice that the viper had disappeared,
and she briefly wondered where precisely it had disappeared to,
before sleep descended and she knew no more.
End of part 3