The Family that Chooses You

Chapter 44: Connections and Disconnection

Harry sat by Hermione, not even knowing if she knew he was there.  He held her clenched hand in both of his, hoping that she did.  He sat and thought over the last few days.  It seemed like no matter what happened, things always seemed to get worse somehow.

He tried to follow Oliver's advice from earlier in the year: place concerns into categories and see what he could help with and what he could not.  Sadly most things seem to be going into the 'could not' category, much to his frustration.

Obviously he could not do anything to help those that have been petrified.  The Mandrake potion was starting to be brewed so it was only a matter of time for the victims to be treated.  Hopefully when they were, they would be able to identify the attacker.

Ginny had proven to be even more hostile and withdrawn.  She was barely interacting with anyone, not even her brothers, and prone to hiding somewhere they could not find.  Every time Harry looked at her, every time their eyes met, he saw the same awfully familiar expression that bothered him so much.  Yet before he could approach her, offer any kind of help, she would disappear.

He and Ron decided to see if the off-hand comment Luna made, the one where Ginny said this Tom person blamed Hagrid for a similar situation many years prior, had any merit.  They snuck out after hours under his cloak to visit Hagrid.  Before they could ask him any questions however, Dumbledore had come with the Minister of Magic Cornelius Fudge.  They were removing Hagrid from Hogwarts for the same reason they were coming to talk to him about.

To make things substantially worse, Lucius Malfoy came and told Dumbledore that he had been removed by the School Governors, for failing to manage the situation.  As if removing the Headmaster would help anyone.

Before being taken away, Hagrid had spoken out loud and not quite subtly about anyone wanting answers should "follow the spiders".  Something that made everyone in his tiny cabin at the time look at him with evident confusion, even if two of the looks were invisible.

Harry and Ron attempted to do just that.  They found a few spiders that were crawling with a distinct destination, towards the Forbidden Forest.  When they got towards the deeper parts of the forest though, and seeing just how large the webs were, the boys had stopped.  Ron, having earlier confessed that he had a phobia about spiders, said he really did not like the looks of the webbing.  He told Harry about acromantulas, gigantic spiders that could grow larger than Muggle cars.  Ron said he would continue on, but he really did not want to.

Harry did not want to either.  The webbing gave him a very bad feeling and he agreed with Ron that if the acromantulas were as large as Ron said, there was no way they would be lurking around the castle.  They decided to head back.  As they walked back to the castle, secretly relieved and having a feeling that they dodged something perilous, they still felt low.  They were no nearer to any answers that they sought.

Feeling discouraged, the boys decided to visit Hermione the day after their attempt in going into the forest.  They both sat by her side, lost in their own thoughts.  They started to leave and Harry gave Hermione's hand a last squeeze before he felt something in her clenched hand.  It felt like paper.

After some gentle pulling, he managed to extricate it.  He and Ron read the piece of paper and stared at each other.

"There's a bloody basilisk slithering around the castle?!" Ron asked in a horrified whisper.  "That's Slytherin's pet?!  That man was a maniac."

Harry read the paper again.  "It has to be, it all makes sense.  Spiders run away from it and we've been seeing spiders flee the castle.  People haven't died because they didn't look at it directly."

"Right!" Ron exclaimed.  "Colin's camera, and the mirror."  He looked at the floating form of the petrified ghost.  "Nick must have gotten a good look but he's a ghost.  He can't die again.  Justin must have looked through him."  He pointed at a word Hermione scrawled.  "What do you think 'pipes' means?"