Chapter 39 - The Grey Wolf and the King

Being on the passive side is never pleasant, but Praeris knew full well this was a war she could not take part in.

Slytherin's collective sense of honor was strong. Marcus kept a tight watch on the students, there was no way for her to slip out. And even if she truly dared to help Gryffindor open the Chamber of Secrets, even if Hogwarts didn't close down, she could forget about continuing her old life.

Anxiety made it impossible for Praeris to settle. She had to do something to make herself feel better. She was forced to flip through her mental library, searching for a way to break the deadlock.

"Prince." Draco sat down across from her and crossed his legs. "You look unhappy. What — scared now? Worried my father will have Professor Snape replace you?"

Praeris could barely be bothered to spare him a glance. "No Gryffindors around for you to vent at, so you've come to pick a fight with me?"

"You're always so tactless!"

Draco's mood around her was impossibly unstable. Every time, he would walk over wearing pure arrogance, and walk away in a huff.

Praeris rubbed her temples. She had no desire to argue with him right now. She decided to find something to keep him occupied.

Ah, handling children. Handling children. How did those older nuns at the convent do it?

Right.

"Draco," Praeris said suddenly, "you mentioned the alchemist Valentine's Twelve Keys last time."

"Oh, yes. From the book On the Great Stone of the Ancients." When the topic turned to a subject he loved, Draco became much easier to talk to.

Last year during the Nicolas Flamel incident, Praeris had mentioned that Draco liked collecting books on alchemy. That was no empty claim.

"You never explained last time," Praeris said. "Why was the king devoured by the grey wolf?"

Draco lifted his chin arrogantly and looked down at her through lowered eyes. "See? There are always things you don't know. The king was not passively devoured by the grey wolf."

"The king's soul was sinful. He wanted to purify his spirit through fire, but the king was no wizard and could not survive the flames. So he tempted the grey wolf and had the wolf swallow him whole. When the grey wolf crossed through the fire, the wolf was killed by the flames — but the king inside its belly survived. Thus the king was reborn in the fire, becoming a soul free of sin."

Praeris looked at him seriously. "Does that not create new sin? His rebirth came at the cost of another's life."

Draco shifted a little uneasily. When Praeris stared at him with such intensity, it made him feel a bit creeped out.

"Of course not. That was the price of the grey wolf's greed. The wolf swallowed the king with the mindset of gaining something from him — satisfying hunger counts — and so receiving death as the result is only just. It was an equal transaction. The grey wolf sought to take the king's life, swallowed him, and got it. And the wolf's own life was purified in the fire and transferred to the king."

Praeris suddenly understood. This was the principle behind Dark Arts objects drawing life force from their holders.

If Ginny was the grey wolf, and the mysterious person was the king, then the mysterious person had tempted Ginny's spirit, perhaps even promised her things she wanted, perhaps deceived her with sweet words.

The mysterious king could not survive long in reality. If he wanted to make his soul more solid, he had to obtain Ginny's soul power. So Ginny the grey wolf was deceived by the king and opened her stomach, her soul, to him, allowing him to manipulate her into doing evil.

When this temptation deepened to a certain point, Ginny the grey wolf would cross the boundary of "fire," transferring her life to the mysterious king and allowing him to be reborn.

At this thought, Praeris hesitated. Perhaps it wasn't necessarily rebirth. Maybe it was simply making his soul more solid? Resurrection was never that easy, and this was only the mysterious person's Dark Arts creation.

This also meant Ginny was in grave danger. Her disappearance meant the mysterious person no longer needed to lie dormant inside Ginny's "stomach." At any moment, they could cross the boundary of the soul's "fire" and move toward an irreversible future.

Praeris said with admiration, "I didn't expect you to have such a thorough understanding of alchemy."

Draco said smugly, "You do occasionally have moments of decent taste."

But what Praeris didn't know was that Harry had done very well, better than she had imagined. Although he hadn't found the diary's second holder, he had located the Chamber of Secrets through Myrtle, drawn the sword of Gryffindor, saved Ginny, and saved himself.

On the other side, when the professors stood breathlessly before the lavatory, Harry was propping himself up with the longsword, and Ron was supporting Ginny as they crawled out of the Chamber of Secrets entrance, covered in mud and slime.

"Ginny!" Mrs. Weasley shot forward like a cannonball, throwing her arms around both of her children.

Professor McGonagall heard herself let out a heavy sigh of relief. "You, you cannot imagine how I felt when I saw that letter. We couldn't find you anywhere, Harry. That's when we knew you must have come here."

"Well done," Professor McGonagall said with a warm, kind smile.

"That must have been Spoon who wrote it," Ron said. "All he knows how to do is write letters."

Harry quickly said, "Don't be like that, Ron. We should thank him. He told us Myrtle was the victim from fifty years ago."

With that, Harry told Dumbledore and the professors everything that had happened during this time. Ginny also confessed that she had been speaking with the mysterious person through the diary.

.

"If you ask me—"

Draco hadn't even finished speaking when Marcus walked in. "Oh. Not sure if it's good news, but it's all over. In any case, everyone's free to move about now."

Draco shot to his feet. "Marcus, what is that supposed to mean?!"

Praeris let out a breath of relief. Her spine, which had been ramrod straight, relaxed against the back of her chair.

"I don't know the details," Marcus said as he walked. "What the professors mean is, the matter's been resolved. No one else will be hurt. There might even be a feast. Alright, you won't want to hear the next part, Gryffindor has been awarded 400 points. Do you really need to know that much?"

The Slytherin common room instantly erupted into noise. Praeris stood amidst it, her feelings deeply conflicted.

She knew that if she revealed she was the one who wrote the letter, she might earn 200 points as well, but that wouldn't change the final outcome.

Quite the opposite, in fact. She now had to go stand guard at Hermione's side and stop her from revealing her identity.

A few minutes later, Praeris was seated in the hospital wing. She had lied to Madam Pomfrey, claiming she had a stomachache.

"I think I ate something bad. I had some biscuits from the Slytherin cupboard. Pansy said they were from the year before last."

After she drank the anti-diarrhea potion, in truth, she had taken the chance to pour it into a potted plant, Praeris naturally began helping Madam Pomfrey, just as she had helped Professor Sprout, personally administering the Mandrake Restorative Draught to Granger.

When Hermione's eyes could move, the first thing she saw was her rival and her temporary pen pal, Praeris of Slytherin.

"You—"

Praeris shushed her and whispered, "It's been resolved. You did very well. Promise me you won't tell anyone who your pen pal is, alright?"

Hermione's lower body was still slowly recovering, but she could speak fluently now. "Our victory wouldn't have been possible without you. This isn't fair to you."

"Without me, you would have done just as well. Potter found the Chamber of Secrets on his own. I helped you for my own benefit, it's not something worth celebrating. Your success is the best reward I could ask for. Next time, I won't help you. Don't forget I'm a Slytherin." Praeris straightened up. "I should go help Madam Pomfrey now."

The moment Praeris heard that Gryffindor had been awarded 400 points, she knew Potter and Weasley had found the Chamber of Secrets before the professors did. If the professors had resolved it, they wouldn't have brought Weasley along.

Hermione opened her hand and saw the note on her palm had vanished. She realized, too, that Harry and the others had solved the mystery.

She covered her face and laughed in delight, proud of her friends' cleverness.

The days that followed were truly unkind to Slytherin. Everyone attended Harry Potter's celebratory feast with dark expressions.

"I don't think we should even be here!"

Zabini ground the words out through clenched teeth.

But Praeris thought it was bearable. She hadn't been sent back to the convent. Her current life, though far from beautiful, was something she could easily be content with.

Did she care about those 200 points?

In the beginning, she hadn't actually liked the House Cup system. She saw it as a zero-sum game, one that more or less served to sow discord among the four houses.

Later, she had actively helped earn points so that the professors and her peers could be happy. She was willing to make the people around her feel a little better.

Now she could comfort herself with the zero-sum game argument again. Who would want to participate in such a stupid system anyway!

Deep down, she knew that for defeating a basilisk, Potter deserved those points, but she would never admit it.

.

"Spoon? Him?" Hermione hesitated. "Ah. Yes, it was him. And then?"

Ron speculated wildly. "I think he had bad intentions. Think about it, who else but the person who did it would know the truth so easily? Maybe he was the one who put the diary, "

"No, Ron. That was Lucius Malfoy," Harry quickly said. "But Hermione, who is this person really?"

Hermione rolled her eyes at Ron. "In your eyes, no one has good intentions! I was able to figure out it was a basilisk, does that make me the culprit too? He's my pen pal. I won't tell anyone who he is. Don't ask again!"

With that, Hermione turned and walked away.

"You've made her angry," Harry said.

Ron rubbed his nose sheepishly. "Weren't we all supposed to agree not to talk casually with people whose backgrounds we don't know?"

Ron was referring to the Ginny incident. He now saw pen pals as some kind of monstrous scourge, all pen pals must be executed without exception.

"That's true," Harry said, "but if you say another word, she won't talk to you either."

Ron said loudly, "She's already not talking to me!"

Hermione wrote about this in a letter, complaining at length about Ron's suspicion toward Praeris, and bemoaning the cancellation of exams.

"I had resolved to defeat you in this exam," Hermione wrote.

Praeris the healer wrote back: "This is called stimulus generalization. He was terrified by what happened to his sister. Now whenever he sees the term 'pen pal,' he can't stay calm. I recommend exposure therapy. You could make a few safe pen pals and let him see that pen pals are nothing to fear. Also, I look forward to your challenge, but you were petrified for so many days, such a match wouldn't be fair."

"You're the one who said that in battle, we can never predict what will happen next, and real life is the same. Being petrified is no excuse for skipping exams. I would much rather compete with you properly. Also, 'Spoon' is really not a very elegant pen name."

Hermione had easily guessed the meaning behind Praeris's pen name. Praeris was Polaris. And the shape of the Big Dipper was exactly that of a spoon, by drawing a line through Dubhe and Merak, one could locate the position of the North Star.

Praeris had thought this was quite subtle. Surely, for someone who didn't know the truth, it would be very difficult to connect "Spoon" to Praeris.

But as it turned out, the clever ones were not limited to her and Hermione.

Or rather, in this world, besides those who knew the truth, there was one man who understood Praeris extremely well.

In the Potions office, the dim yellow firelight cast Snape's shadow long, stretching across the walls and ceiling.

Praeris's letter lay on Snape's desk.

Before leaving, he had made an excuse to ask Professor McGonagall for the letter that had been left at the office door. Now, the words of Potter and Weasley echoed in his mind.

TAP, TAP, TAP,

Snape's left hand rubbed over the letter, while his other hand tapped the desk again and again.

"Foolish!" Snape said under his breath, his tone thick with suppressed fury. "A thoroughly Gryffindor act!"

When a child goes quiet, mischief is surely afoot.

He ought to be angry. He couldn't not be angry.

Did Gryffindor traits run in the blood?

He stood up and hurled the letter into the fireplace. The suddenly fierce flames illuminated his dark, brooding face.

This was the second time he had cleaned up after this wretched child. Could she not apply her clever mind to controlling her absurd behavior?!

Snape let out a heavy sigh and pressed his fingers to the bridge of his nose.

He felt deeply weary. He had thought only Potter would bring him trouble, now it seemed Praeris had entered her rebellious phase as well.

But then, with a complex expression that defied parsing, he looked at the ashes in the fireplace.

She was indeed clever, wasn't she? Faster and more precise in her deductions than Gryffindor. To write that letter without being able to reach the scene in person, without anyone else's help, ensuring that even if Potter failed, the professors could arrive in time to save Weasley.

Of course, if only she would apply that cleverness to other matters,

Never mind. Looking on the bright side, the fact that she hadn't been sorted into Gryffindor was already heaven's favor to him. What more could he expect!

"Professor? May I come in?" Praeris's voice sounded from outside the door.

Snape's low voice came from behind the door. "Miss Prince, must I invite you in myself?"

Who had angered him now?

➤ Next: Summer Returns