Chapter 35: Visitors to the School Hospital
When Draco Malfoy suddenly woke up again, Lucius and Narcissa had already left quietly.
The moonlight was dim, the night was deep, and the ward was gloomy and dark. The candlelight was flickering, the wind was blowing, and the air was lonely and silent.
Reflections of pain swayed in the quiet atmosphere. Draco sighed unbearably, thinking that he might be hallucinating - he could hear the sound of bones growing in his ears.
When the pain came, he felt extremely cold in his heart.
He was the only one in the ward.
Or maybe not.
In the darkness, he sensitively heard a subtle rustling sound.
"Who is it?" Draco asked warily, a wave of pain coming over him as he spoke.
"It's me." It was Harry's voice.
"What are you doing here, Harry?" Draco asked, confused.
Harry didn't get the Snitch... he should be very angry now.
Harry probably won't want to pay attention to him, Draco thought to himself.
"I wanted to see if you were okay. The Bludger seemed to be coming towards me, and I affected you." There was a hint of guilt in Harry's voice.
Draco was surprised that Harry would think that.
Harry didn't care who got the Snitch, nor who lost the game, but was worried about him? Amidst the pain, a faint sense of wonder surged in Draco's heart.
Harry seemed to... genuinely treat him as a friend.
"That's none of your business. I should have been smarter and avoided it," Draco said. As he spoke, a nerve in his jaw tugged, and his face grew paler. "Actually, this game wasn't fair. You spent almost half your time dodging the Bludger instead of looking for the Snitch."
Secretly, Draco wanted a fairer playing field.
He is no longer the boy in his previous life who childishly used pranks to skirt the rules.
He... doesn't want to win unfairly.
He wanted to see if he could defeat Harry based on his strength alone.
Harry had taken off his Invisibility Cloak. His face suddenly appeared above Draco's line of sight. He opened his mouth, about to say something, but suddenly his ears pricked up and he froze in place.
"Listen!" he said to Draco in a panic. "Who's talking?" He moved closer to the stone wall at the head of Draco's bed, listening intently and looking around.
"What?" Draco asked, confused.
He heard nothing but Harry's voice.
"That voice—don't speak yet—"
Harry's face vanished from Draco's view, stirring up a faint breeze. He seemed to be tracking an invisible monster, darting past the rows of beds in the hospital wing, his voice clamoring, "Listen!"
"Nothing!" Draco said, wondering if there was something wrong with his eardrum.
Harry said nothing more. He stopped walking. He stood frozen in the corner for a long time, finally lowering his head.
"Not anymore." Draco heard his frustrated voice from the other end of the ward.
"I didn't hear anything." Draco spoke with difficulty, his limbs and bones screaming in pain.
"That's not surprising." Harry returned to sit down next to Draco's bed and said dejectedly, "Hermione and Ron didn't hear it last time either. They thought I was crazy."
He said dejectedly, "You think so too?"
The moon's shadow floated, and the clouds and fog dissipated. With the bright moonlight outside the window, Draco slowly raised his head a little, and finally he could see Harry's face clearly - he saw Harry smiling bitterly.
"I don't think so," Draco said seriously, ignoring the pain.
There was a sound of hurried footsteps coming from outside the school hospital.
"Hide quickly." Draco said hurriedly, pretending to be asleep and closing his eyes. Harry hurriedly hid under Draco's bed. The thick sheets hanging down the side of the bed blocked his view and also blocked any eyes that wanted to peek under the bed.
"What's going on?" Draco couldn't turn his head, but he could tell it was Madam Pomfrey's voice, raised several octaves.
"Another attack," Professor Dumbledore said slowly, his voice old and tired. "Minerva found him on the stairs."
There was a rustling noise, as if someone was moving something.
"Could he have taken a photograph of his attacker?" said Professor Dumbledore, with a hint of anticipation in his voice.
The pungent smell of burning plastic gradually came from next door. Draco couldn't help but wrinkle his nose slightly in the dark.
"Merlin! It's all melted!" exclaimed Madam Pomfrey.
Several professors exclaimed in shock, exchanged a few anxious words, and left in a hurry.
Madam Pomfrey walked over to Draco's bedside and took a look at him. Draco immediately pretended to be asleep. Noticing nothing unusual, she poured some more dreamless sleeping potion into his mouth and hurried away, closing the door of the hospital wing behind her.
When everything was completely silent, Harry crawled out from under the bed again. He didn't say anything to Draco immediately, but instead moved his footsteps to the bed next to him.
"It's Colin Creevey. He's been petrified." After a moment's silence, Harry returned to Draco's bedside and said solemnly, "I saw him before I came here, and he asked me where I was going. He must have been following me secretly. God, this is all my fault! I thought... I had gotten rid of him."
"What's that to you?" Draco hissed, fighting off the sharp pain of his growing bones. "You didn't petrify him."
Harry felt strangely relieved at Draco's unsympathetic words.
Deep down in his heart, he had a similar thought. He really had nothing to do with this matter!
Like everyone else, he was shocked and heartbroken about Mrs. Norris being petrified!
But why did Filch doubt him?
He had done nothing. Why did Mr. Filch insist that he was the one who petrified Mrs. Norris? The caretaker had been hounding him these days, thinking he should be held responsible and at least give a reasonable explanation.
"I'll keep an eye on you." He still remembered Mr. Filch's gloomy face and what he had said.
Even under Mr. Filch's tireless surveillance, some gossip had spread around him - some students began to whisper that he was the heir of Slytherin's Chamber of Secrets.
This made him panic. He remembered what the Sorting Hat had said to him, that he would succeed in Slytherin House. Could he be a Slytherin? Could he be the Heir of Slytherin?
Confused and uneasy, Harry really needed someone to step out and speak out this defense for him.
"Thank you, Draco." Harry said to the boy on the bed. Seeing the pale smile that slightly appeared on Draco's face, he couldn't wait to ask: "Did you hear what Professor Dumbledore just said? He said that the Chamber of Secrets is really open. And what do you think of his words 'The question is not who, but how'?"
Draco had, of course, heard what Dumbledore said. After a long silence, he said slowly, "Harry, I think I have an idea of 'who'."
"Really?" Harry excitedly grabbed Draco's hand, then let go when he cried out in pain. "Oh! Sorry, I forgot."
"Can I assume that you heard the same sound when Mrs. Norris had an accident? The kind that no one else can hear?" Draco asked with a distorted face, enduring the excruciating pain of his bones recovering.
"Yes..." Harry hesitated for a moment, then finally confessed, "That day, we went to the Deathday party. Afterwards, we were hungry and wanted to go upstairs to eat something made by living people. That's when I heard a strange noise, so I chased it all the way over and found Mrs. Norris's petrified body on the third floor. Hermione asked me not to tell anyone about this, and Ron also said that hearing strange noises that no one else can hear is not a good sign."
Draco had known for a while that Harry was a Parseltongue. He just didn't know how to put it all together.
Until now, combined with the details Harry confessed to him, everything was connected.
The noise Harry heard was most likely the sound of a basilisk.
Every time the basilisk appeared, Harry would be attracted by the sound that no one else could hear and run all the way to the victim.
He was like a divine hummingbird smelling a flower, or a Niffler seeing a gold coin. Like a murderer who frequently appeared at crime scenes, these strange coincidences, in the eyes of the bewildered crowd, led to one inevitable conclusion: he was not innocent; he must be connected.
In previous lives, rumors became more and more outrageous as they spread.
In the end, Harry was recognized as the heir of Slytherin's Chamber of Secrets.
"They're right, you really shouldn't tell anyone about this. People will be horrified and even afraid of you." Suddenly, Draco understood Hermione's hesitation in not wanting to tell him the details.
He understood why she kept things from him.
She was a loyal girl to her friends. Since she was willing to keep a secret for Draco and not tell anyone else, she was also willing to keep a secret for Harry and not tell anyone else.
It wasn't that she didn't trust him; she was just loyal to her friends. He had long known her character, so why should he hold it against her? Draco twitched the corners of his mouth slightly.
Draco's mood improved a little as he imagined the little girl blowing the Bludger to pieces.
He didn't want to waste any time, so he asked Harry directly: "Tell me, Harry, have you ever talked to a snake?"
"Only once. I accidentally set a python free in a Muggle zoo – it's a long story – before I knew I was a wizard," said Harry.
"That should be right. Harry, you're a Parseltongue," Draco said without any prelude.
His words were blunt with pain.
"Parseltongue?" Harry asked. "What does that mean?"
"In short, you can talk to snakes. It's Salazar Slytherin's speciality. The symbol of Slytherin House is a snake," Draco said, with a wry laugh.
Harry stood there speechless.
After a moment, he asked hoarsely, "Why me? Am I some distant relative of Slytherin?"
"I don't know." Draco said tiredly, trying not to think about the thirty-odd bones that were violently growing in his body. "It's not impossible. I never heard of any Parseltongue in the Potter family until you showed up. Maybe you can look up the family tree someday to see if there are any branches of Slytherin descendants who married into your ancestors. In short, you are definitely not schizophrenic or have a brain problem."
"That's a relief," Harry said with a hint of sarcasm, and Draco could tell he wasn't feeling any relief.
"So, I'm a Parseltongue. What does that mean? Should I be in Slytherin, not Gryffindor?" Harry said with a hint of irritability in his tone.
"Don't worry about that! The Sorting Hat has already made its decision. You're a Gryffindor," Draco said gruffly. "That's not the point of my conversation. The point is that those strange noises you hear that no one else can hear might be because you're a Parseltongue."
Draco couldn't be blamed for his impatience. It was too painful. Every vibration caused by his voice made him hear the crackling sound of his bones growing.
Harry's voice softened. He finally began to think along the lines of Draco's words. "You mean, the voices I heard were snakes? That Mrs. Norris and Colin Creevey were petrified by snakes? Is that even possible? I mean, aren't snakes supposed to bite with their fangs?"
Even though he could only see the dark ceiling of the ward, Draco could roughly imagine Harry's face full of question marks.
"Harry, imagine, would Salazar Slytherin use an ordinary snake to guard such an important Chamber of Secrets? It must be an extraordinary snake, a snake that can live for thousands of years. I mean, a basilisk." Draco said drowsily.
His eyelids grew heavy as the hypnotic element in Madam Pomfrey's potion began to take effect.
"Bassilisk?" Harry asked. "Are you sure?"
"Of course, this is just my guess." Draco yawned with difficulty to prevent the violent vibration from irritating his sensitive and fragile new bones. "Do some research, Harry. The wizarding world is far more vast and complex than you imagine. At least ask Hermione. She didn't read all those library books for nothing."
"Okay," Harry said reluctantly. "So, what about that 'what' Professor Dumbledore was talking about? Do you have any guesses?"
"I'm trying to figure that out, too," Draco said softly. "But, Harry, isn't curfew coming up soon?"
"It's past curfew," Harry said, glancing at the wall clock. He jumped up and grabbed his Invisibility Cloak and pulled it on. "I have to go! They're both still waiting for me in the common room."
"Let's go, let's go, stay away from the third floor, don't let Mr. Filch catch you..." Draco muttered incoherently, and fell into an exhausting and painful dream again.
On Sunday morning, Draco was blinded by the glare of the winter sun.
After a night of wild growth, his bones had been repaired and no longer caused him severe pain. But when he lifted his arms and tried to get up and move around, he still felt very stiff.
The ward was quiet and peaceful, with only rows of empty white beds and sunlight filling the room.
And Madam Pomfrey.
She was drawing the curtains around Colin Creevey's bed, and when Draco woke up, she came over with the breakfast tray and began to examine his bones.
"You're recovering well," Madam Pomfrey said with satisfaction. "After breakfast and changing your own clothes, you can leave." After that, she walked out of the ward briskly and considerately closed the door for Draco.
Draco had no appetite. After symbolically taking a few mouthfuls of porridge, he hastily put down his spoon and swiftly changed from his hospital gown into his own clothes. He was considering whether to pull open the curtains of the bed next door to see the unfortunate Colin Creevey.
At this moment, the ward was silent, and no one except Draco could breathe.
However, the next second, a loud explosion broke the atmosphere.
"I'm sorry, little master!" Dobby knelt on the ground with tears in his eyes and banged his head violently against the ground.
"Stop! What's going on?" Draco asked in confusion.
He found that Dobby's fingers were covered with bandages - it seemed that he had burned himself.
"Dobby's Bludger hurt the little master! Dobby didn't mean to do that!" It shook its body back and forth, its ugly big head swaying from side to side.
"What do you mean? What do you mean by your Bludger? You did it? You almost killed me?" Draco suddenly became furious. This sudden information shocked and angered him. "Why? Who gave you the order?"
"I'm not going to kill you, absolutely not, little master!" Dobby's big eyes were filled with fear. "Dobby just wants Harry Potter to go home! Going home seriously injured is better than staying here! History will repeat itself, the Chamber of Secrets has been opened, and Harry Potter is in danger! Dobby just wants to help!"
"What do you mean by history repeating itself? What else do you know?" Draco asked in surprise.
"When Dobby was cleaning the fireplace in the study, he heard the owner say in the study that the Chamber of Secrets had been opened again. Something about Harry Potter, the Weasley family, and how they were doomed! Dobby was terrified!" Dobby said tremblingly, his ears drooping in grievance.
Recently, Draco had no tasks for Dobby, so he ordered it to go back to Malfoy Manor to work with other house-elves. Unexpectedly, he was tricked by it when he was not paying attention.
Merlin! You can never underestimate Dobby's Harry Potter fanaticism.
"Dobby! Harry is my friend. I will protect him. He's not a fool. He can protect himself!" Draco could no longer maintain his composure. He angrily said, "You did a terrible job, Dobby! Deduct your salary!"
"The young master is willing to risk his life for Harry Potter! It doesn't matter if his salary is deducted!" Dobby sobbed sadly and happily, "But Dobby still hopes that Harry Potter can go home, and the young master should go home too! Everyone should go home!"
"This is not something you can decide. You are being completely self-righteous! Stop trying to hurt Harry and let him go home! This is my order! Never use the Bludger to hurt anyone again! In fact, you are not allowed to come to Hogwarts or get close to Harry Potter without my summons!" Draco scratched his hair irritably, not even bothering to give Dobby a glance.
He didn't even want to see this disgusting thing again!
Dobby sobbed and disappeared sadly.
At this moment, there was a noise at the door of the ward, followed by the sound of hurried footsteps.
Draco cursed inwardly and rushed over to open the door, only to see a strand of brown hair disappear around the corner at the end of the corridor.
The length and curve of the hair made it impossible for him to ignore - it was Hermione.
She heard everything.