Chapter 96: The Bathroom Clue

The Christmas intrusion removed one theory without solving the larger problem. Draco knew no entrance in Slytherin. The old house records Edward had checked named no hidden chamber beneath the common room. Hermione's investigation, reckless as it had been, had produced the same absence.

Edward returned to the map.

He did so in daylight, at a library table, with a note from Professor McGonagall allowing him to compare public castle plans with the attack locations. The restriction was explicit: no opening walls, no entering maintenance passages, no experiments on plumbing, and no independent search after curfew.

Hermione joined him after Madam Pomfrey released her.

They marked Mrs. Norris near the second-floor corridor. Colin had been found near another route leading upward from the lower floors. Justin and Nearly Headless Nick had been attacked near a passage connecting the library and central stairs.

"They do not make a neat line," Hermione said.

"Good. Neat lines have been suspicious lately."

She ignored that and traced the nearest bathrooms, sinks, and old water routes. The plans were incomplete. Hogwarts had been repaired too many times by too many people.

One location kept returning to their notes for a different reason: the unused girls' bathroom where Moaning Myrtle lived.

Hermione became very still.

Edward noticed. "You know something."

"I know Myrtle died at Hogwarts."

"So do most students."

"She died in that bathroom."

That was more useful.

They checked a school history and found only a brief reference to a student death during the previous opening of the Chamber. The name was omitted. Myrtle herself, however, had never been shy about discussing her death when someone was unfortunate enough to ask.

Edward looked at Hermione.

"We tell McGonagall."

Hermione sighed. "I knew you were going to say that."

"I am becoming predictable."

McGonagall approved an interview with Myrtle on one condition: a professor would know where they were and remain nearby. Professor Flitwick drew the short straw.

The bathroom was colder than Edward remembered from passing its door. Several taps leaked. The stalls were battered, and Myrtle floated above one of them with the expression of someone delighted to have visitors who were required to listen.

"You want to know how I died," she said.

Hermione nodded. "Only if you are willing to tell us."

Myrtle immediately became more willing than either expected.

She had been crying in a stall after another girl mocked her glasses. She heard a boy speaking outside in a strange language. When she opened the door to tell him to leave, she saw a pair of enormous yellow eyes near one of the sinks.

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Then she died.

Edward did not need to look at Hermione. The same conclusion had reached them both.

"Which sink?" Flitwick asked.

Myrtle pointed.

They approached only after the professor examined the area. One tap had a tiny snake scratched beside its handle. It did not work.

Edward crouched without touching it. "Could be decoration."

Hermione stared at him. "You do not believe that."

"I believe it is suspicious."

Flitwick tested the stone with ordinary revealing charms. Nothing opened. The pipe beneath the sink was too narrow to admit even a child, but the castle plans showed repairs in the wall behind it that did not match the visible room.

"Parseltongue," Hermione said.

Edward nodded slowly. If the entrance answered to snake speech, Harry might be able to open it without understanding how.

Flitwick ended the visit there.

"No one asks Mr. Potter to try until Professor Dumbledore decides how to proceed."

"Agreed," Edward said.

Hermione agreed too.

For once, agreement was enough.

The staff closed the bathroom. Snape and McGonagall inspected the surrounding corridors, and Dumbledore was informed. Edward did not receive the results of every spell they used, nor should he have.

What he did receive was an instruction to stay away.

That became difficult after Harry reported hearing the hidden voice again.

Edward learned only the broad fact from Hermione. Harry described hissing that seemed to move inside the walls. The pipe theory now had a witness with the ability to understand the sound.

"He should tell Dumbledore himself," Edward said.

"He is afraid people will think it proves he is the Heir."

"People already think that. Hiding useful information will not improve the situation."

Hermione knew he was right and looked annoyed by it.

Later that day, Harry did report the voice under McGonagall's supervision. Edward was not present. He heard afterward that the staff were treating the bathroom as a serious lead while keeping students away from it.

That should have ended Edward's involvement.

Instead, he began thinking about how the creature traveled once it left the entrance.

A Basilisk large enough to kill with a glance could not pass through ordinary pipes. Magical spaces might widen. Serpentine magic might change the route. Or the old accounts might exaggerate its size.

Edward wrote possibilities until the page filled.

Then he stopped.

He had no permission to test any of them.

At the hospital wing, where he returned Hermione's second library book, she noticed the folded map beneath his arm.

"You are not going back to the bathroom."

"That sounded less like a question than McGonagall."

"Good."

Edward sat near the foot of the bed while Madam Pomfrey finished checking the last traces of Hermione's accidental transformation.

"I am not going tonight," he said.

Hermione narrowed her eyes. "That final word is doing suspicious work."

Edward did not answer.

The truth was that the bathroom had become more tempting because it was now a real clue. He disliked leaving the next step entirely to adults, even after months of learning why he should.

His fire magic offered no special way to find the Basilisk. It could not sense Dark creatures through stone, identify hidden doors, or tell him when an attack occurred. The only useful question it raised was whether he could become less vulnerable while moving through a narrow space.

That thought led back to Elementalization.

Edward had practiced turning portions of his body into fire under supervision. A hand, an arm, a shoulder for an instant. Full transformation remained unstable. Compression was even less tested.

Trying to force his whole body into a pipe was exactly the kind of idea Snape would reject before Edward finished the sentence.

The following morning, Edward asked Flitwick whether a student could ever be asked to enter an unknown magical passage because of an unusual ability. The professor's answer was immediate.

"Not merely because the student can," he said. "Ability is not consent, training, or suitability. If a specialist is needed, the responsible adult finds a specialist."

Edward thought of Harry's Parseltongue and his own fire. Both could tempt adults or students into assigning responsibility to whoever happened to possess the unusual gift.

"And if there is no specialist?"

"Then the adults decide whether the task should be attempted at all."

That answer was irritating precisely because it left no heroic exception for Edward to claim.

That should have been sufficient warning.

Edward returned to the common room and opened Regulus's notes instead of visiting the bathroom. He told himself he was only studying theory.

The distinction would matter very little if he turned theory into another secret experiment.