As expected, we were immediately suspected of having petrified Mrs. Norris. Mr. Filch, drawn by the commotion, arrived to find his beloved cat stiff as a board—and he lunged at us in a fury. Given the situation, it was hard to blame him, but his refusal to listen to a single word was impossible to deal with. Just then, a lifeline appeared: Dumbledore arrived, teachers in tow.
After Dumbledore managed to calm Filch, we were herded to the nearest place for questioning—Lockhart's office. Of all the rooms in Hogwarts to visit after something so grim, it had to be the least appropriate. The moment the door opened, we were assaulted by rows of Lockhart's grinning portraits. We sat in chairs ringed by professors. After the night's uproar, every one of us—myself included—was worn to the bone.
While Dumbledore and Professor McGonagall examined Mrs. Norris, Filch glared at us as if he meant to kill. Snape all but failed to hide a pleased little smile, as though our predicament delighted him. Lockhart, meanwhile, flitted about the room, vanity bursting as he spouted a stream of inane theories. The whole scene felt unhinged. If they'd been babbling about something trivial, I might even have found it amusing. Unfortunately, the situation was anything but.
After a while, Dumbledore finished and told Filch that Mrs. Norris wasn't dead—only turned to stone. Relief softened Filch's face… but if even Dumbledore couldn't lift the curse on the spot, this was no simple Petrification.
Given what was written on the wall, I had assumed the prime suspect would be me—a Slytherin. Instead, Filch fixed on Harry. Being a Squib, he claimed Harry had found out and turned his cat to stone out of spite.
That Filch is a Squib seems obvious enough—he goes around mopping floors, after all. With house-elves on staff, there's no real need for him to do such work. What are the terms of his employment, exactly? A hobby? Some policy to promote Squib jobs? I doubt the wizarding world holds such lofty ideals… perhaps it's Dumbledore's arrangement.
Exhausted, my mind wandered to things wholly unsuited to the moment. The debate raged on around my silence.
Snape's presence only sharpened the attack on Harry. According to the trio, they had attended a "Deathday Party" in the dungeons (which sounded unspeakably gloomy) and were on their way back to their dormitory when they stumbled upon the scene. I knew the latter part was a lie, but I kept my mouth shut. If I said, "Harry heard a voice no one else could," it would only undermine the trio's credibility—and Lockhart and Snape would trumpet Harry's supposed madness across the castle. If it needed saying, it should be told to Dumbledore alone.
Since Slytherin's dormitory is in the dungeons, it was suspicious that I'd been seen on the third floor of another tower. For the moment, Harry had drawn so much heat that no one pressed me. Even if they did, I had an alibi: I'd been in the Great Hall until near the end of the Halloween feast. As for after, I could only claim I'd chatted with them partway down the corridor.
Snape kept trying to drag Harry down, but when he carelessly suggested banning him from Quidditch, he hit Professor McGonagall's last nerve and earned a ferocious rebuke. As ever, a burst of emotion revealed the flaw in his maneuvering.
Filch insisted some punishment had to be handed down, but Dumbledore overruled him.
"Professor Sprout has only just managed to obtain mandrakes," he said. "Once they've matured, we'll brew the potion at once and revive Mrs. Norris."
That single statement conveyed far more than he intended—and it shook me. Mandrakes are a common ingredient; they aren't hard to procure. So the reason we had to wait for them to grow wasn't the plants themselves, but the potion.
In the wizarding world, magic—including potions—can be measured in two ways: by sheer power, and by precision—how exactly an effect finds its target. The curse on the Defense Against the Dark Arts post is the perfect example. Change the title, change the structure—no matter. The curse discerns the role's abstract essence and strikes its bearer. That is a feat of frightening sophistication.
The Mandrake Restorative Draught belongs in that category. It demands fully matured mandrakes harvested in a narrow window, processed through steps so elaborate they seem irrational, brewed according to rigorous procedure, and administered within a strictly limited period of efficacy. Its potency even depends on the soil in which the mandrakes were grown. In other words, this cannot be solved by importing mandrakes—or the potion—from elsewhere.
A potion so complex and precise reads the essence of its target and acts accordingly. Which means Dumbledore had not found an easier remedy than a brew that required six months or more of growth. It even suggested he might not have a firm suspect for the cause at all.
I realized this crisis was moving beyond control—far more than the last time—and I was, for a moment, at a loss.
At length the questioning ended, and we were sternly ordered straight back to our dormitories. The trio ignored that entirely—fortunately for me. They dragged me into a nearby classroom to talk through what had happened. Not that they had much more to share than what I'd already heard.
Harry fretted over whether keeping the "voice" to himself had been wise. I insisted he should tell Dumbledore—honestly, I was prepared to tell him myself tomorrow—but Weasley argued it would make Harry seem mad. To be fair, I wouldn't tell anyone else either.
But what was that voice only Harry could hear? It was probably tied to the Dark Lord, but we had no proof. The simplest idea—that he'd been cursed without realizing it and was hearing things—felt unlikely under Dumbledore's constant watch.
And why had the voice led Harry there? It hadn't actually killed anyone—but it had summoned a third party to the scene. Why?
While I stewed over that, the trio fixated on the words scrawled on the wall—"The Chamber has been opened." In other words, the Chamber of Secrets. I had no desire to bring it up, but as a way into what I needed to say about "Mudbloods," it was, regrettably, perfect.
I looked at the three of them, heads close together, and spoke quietly.
"…I think it refers to the legendary chamber Salazar Slytherin left within Hogwarts."
And then I told them about Slytherin—and blood purity.
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Now, this will take a while. It's a history lesson.
What I'm about to tell you isn't like Professor Binns's History of Magic lectures. I won't be talking about gargoyle strikes, werewolf codes of conduct, or goblin rebellions—none of the non-human tales. Nor will I dwell on famed but fleeting figures like Emeric the Evil or Egbert the Egregious.
What I'm telling is the history of wizardkind as a whole. The story of uncounted, unnamed witches and wizards—ordinary people—who nonetheless lived and shaped their times. How they were carried along in the currents of their age. How they lived.
Faces help, of course, so let me begin with a simple example: my own ancestor.
The founder of the Malfoy line in England was Armand Malfoy. He came from Normandy in France and arrived in Britain in the eleventh century with William the Conqueror.
Before that, there are almost no records of how our family lived in France. Still, our name—"mal foy," or "bad faith"—is thought to be the mark of persecution by Muggles—no, by Christians. A warning, if you like. A name carved with the malice directed at us, so we would never forget it. Whether that's truly how it happened, no one can say now.
In any case, in the tenth century there was no International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy to govern the magical world. Naturally, wizards mingled with Muggles far more closely than they do now. My ancestors were no exception. Armand, if I may be bold, served William much as Merlin served King Arthur.
Whether William himself was a pure Muggle is unknown. Kings were believed capable of working "healing miracles," and I suspect that faith sprang from wizarding blood in their line. That is how faint the boundary between wizard and Muggle could be.
Before the Statute, Muggles and wizards routinely formed single factions—villages, towns, kingdoms, even peoples. Sometimes they acknowledged magic openly; sometimes they hid its source. Either way, wizards were woven into society.
Before William began his conquest, Britain was in the Heptarchy, and even then, each polity mixed Muggles and wizards. People didn't fight wizard versus wizard, or Muggle versus wizard, so much as tangled bands of humans drawn along simple lines of geography.
Against that backdrop of conflict, Hogwarts was raised in the Highlands. Today, even Muggles consider it normal to gather children in one place to educate them. In the tenth century, nothing was normal. There were far fewer ways for any child to attend school. And "every magical child in Britain and Ireland" was born into the island's countless swirling feuds.
You might think we still have divides—supporters of the Dark Lord and everyone else. But we, more or less, stand together as British witches and wizards, and our institutions name the Dark Lord for what he is: evil. We share a common understanding—vague as it may be—and we can say "we."
Back then, the lens was different. Realms were separate powers, rising and falling with victory and defeat. Children sat at desks beside the offspring of their parents' enemies. Hogwarts was not a place for potential enemies—it seated the heirs of present, active ones in the same school.
Why did the four founders attempt such a thing? Where did they find the will to gather children—many of whom didn't even share a language—and raise them inside one castle? Of course: to protect and educate children of wizardkind—no matter their people, no matter their land.
Even when Muggles and wizards lived side by side, they did not become one people. There was always ignorance and contempt, friction and prejudice—and far more brutal than now. Families like Armand's, who managed their Muggle relations well, fared better. Others did not. In rough settlements, outsiders were easily cast out. The first to suffer that cruelty were children, who had no power to defend themselves.
So, to safeguard the future of wizardkind, Godric Gryffindor, Helga Hufflepuff, Rowena Ravenclaw, and Salazar Slytherin followed the bond of magic, gathered, and built a fortress to protect children. Parts of it may be buried now, but our school is ringed by walls—raised for war, and for defense.
Then came the Sorting. By a peerless magic that could identify every young witch and wizard across Britain and Ireland, the four founders assembled the children and—through a hat with unmatched skill at discerning what each founder sought—divided them into four houses. So far, so good.
But haven't you ever wondered? Compared to the other three, Slytherin's prized quality—"pure-blood"—sticks out. The other houses value traits of character. Why would Slytherin, an educator, choose something so material, so immutable by birth?
The key lies in the era when Hogwarts was made. You can likely see it now.
Slytherin thought like this: pure-bloods would follow the bond of wizardkind and clasp hands. Half-bloods, perhaps, could be tolerated. But Muggle-born… were different. They had no innate belonging to wizardkind. Their loyalty, he believed, would lie with their parents, their land, their people. Which meant—Muggle-born students, shaped by their birth communities, might recreate the world's conflicts within the sanctuary of Hogwarts and betray wizardkind from within. They were unfit for a school meant to protect the future of wizards. That was his fear.
At first, Slytherin could only be satisfied that his own house remained pure-blood. He had to be. The other three founders would not countenance sorting children by birth. But his fear never faded. He dreamed of a pure realm of wizardkind, free of strife. He believed—truly believed—that if a school of purely wizard blood were created, war would end.
Ironically, the other three held the grander ambition: that a school without student bloodshed could exist without choosing by birth. Judging by the present, neither side proved entirely right… but that's another matter.
Slytherin could not be convinced. He quarreled with Gryffindor, lost, and left Hogwarts.
But before he went, he left behind the means for his descendants—who, he believed, would someday come to this school—to realize his ideal.
That "means" was a monster meant to slaughter the Muggle-born he abhorred. Sealed within a place called the Chamber of Secrets, it was said to have slept for a thousand years—waiting for an Heir to awaken it and bring about the "true peace" Slytherin desired.
That is the story of Salazar Slytherin.
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