Elijah stepped into the girls' lavatory on the second floor.
"You again?" Myrtle was drifting near the stalls, her expression sour. She tilted her head, glaring at Ginny with a look of pointed dislike; she had never cared for the girls who were prettier than her.
"You can be quiet, Myrtle." Elijah didn't look up. He flicked his wand with clinical precision. "Confundus."
The ghost's eyes glazed over instantly. Dazed and directionless, she retreated into her preferred U-bend without a word. Elijah moved to the non-functional faucet and hissed. In response to the Parseltongue, the sink sank into the floor, revealing the dark maw of the Chamber of Secrets.
The descent was a blur of slimy stone and cold air. He moved through the muddy tunnels, past the brittle remains of rats, and opened the final threshold. Throughout the journey, Elijah deliberately loosened his grip on Ginny's soul. He allowed her to witness it all—to feel the weight of the air and the dampness of the stone.
She was a passenger in her own body now, a silent ghost watching through her own eyes as Elijah stepped into the long, mist-shrouded hall. Giant stone pillars carved with intertwining serpents rose into the gloom, supporting a ceiling lost to shadow.
Even as a detached observer, Ginny felt a paralyzing chill. But the terror of the room was nothing compared to the realization dawning in her mind.
Deceived.
The truth was a cold blade. "Mr. Riddle" was the Heir. The attacks, the fear, the frantic searches for the culprit—it had all been a game. While she had poured her heart out to him, he had been mocking her foolishness.
"You finally found out?" Elijah murmured, reading her thoughts as easily as a book.
He advanced between the pillars, his footsteps creating hollow echoes that climbed the walls. His face was blank, his movements solemn and ritualistic. The hollow eyes of the stone serpents seemed to track his progress like a silent, loyal guard.
Finally, he reached the end of the hall, where a statue as tall as the room itself loomed against the back wall. It was the face of an ancient, monkey-like man with a thin beard that swept the floor.
"Mr. Riddle…" Ginny's voice was a broken whisper. She had regained enough control to weep, her face wet with tears even as her limbs remained under his command. "I thought we were friends."
"I don't deny that, Ginny."
Elijah began to withdraw. Translucent silver threads, like surging mist, detached from Ginny's form and coalesced into a shimmering figure before her. He looked handsome, gentle, and utterly composed.
"I am grateful for your trust," Elijah said. He felt a flicker of genuine heaviness as he looked at her. "Without you, I would still be trapped in that diary."
He had truly considered her a friend in his own way. Had he not possessed the Philosopher's Stone, he would have left her here to be rescued by Harry while he escaped in a half-formed state. But the Stone changed everything.
"You lied to me!" Ginny roared, the sudden fire of a Gryffindor surging through her grief. "We trusted you! We thought you were helping us!"
"All of us grow up amidst secrets and lies, Ginny," Elijah said softly, his voice carrying the tone of a patient tutor. "Let this be your final lesson: never trust something that can think for itself if you cannot see where it keeps its brain. Keep your secrets to yourself, and give your lies to others."
He leaned in, his expression turning cold. "Provided you live past today."
He saw the terror in her eyes and felt a pang of grim satisfaction. He didn't intend to kill her, but she needed to remember this. The girl was too reckless; she needed a scar on her soul to keep her safe from the next monster she encountered.
Ginny felt a sudden, agonizing pull, as if her very essence was being siphoned from her marrow. Her vision blurred. The shadow of "Mr. Riddle" seemed to solidify into flesh and blood, growing more real as she grew more faint.
Her knees buckled. Elijah stepped forward and caught her before she hit the floor.
He reached into his pocket and withdrew a cloudy, blood-red crystal. The Philosopher's Stone. As he held it, the silver threads of his form began to absorb the red light, deepening into the color of life.
He placed the Stone against Ginny's chest first, letting its restorative power flow into her. Her pale skin regained its flush; her red hair shimmered with renewed vitality. She looked as though she were merely sleeping.
"Sorry," he whispered.
Then, Elijah tilted his head back and swallowed the Stone.
It settled in his chest like a burning coal, becoming a heart. With every pulse, it sent waves of magic through him, weaving nerves, condensing bone, and knitting muscle. For the first time, he drew a breath of his own.
"Fuaaa~"
The air in the Chamber was stagnant and foul, smelling of a thousand years of decay. To Elijah, it was the sweetest thing he had ever tasted. He stood in silence for a minute, savoring the weight of his own limbs, before shaking himself back to reality.
He conjured a set of Hogwarts robes, identical to the ones Tom Riddle had worn fifty years ago, and pulled the Marauder's Map from Ginny's pocket.
On the parchment, Minerva McGonagall's ink-dot was moving toward the girls' lavatory. She paused, likely seeing the message on the wall, before rushing away to alert the staff.
Dumbledore's name was nowhere to be seen.
The absence of the Headmaster made Elijah uneasy, but the map did not lie. "I still have time for the Cloak," he muttered.
He spoke to the statue of Slytherin in the tongue of serpents: "Speak to me, Slytherin—greatest of the Hogwarts Four."
The great stone mouth groaned open.
From the darkness within, a behemoth emerged. The Basilisk, thick as an oak trunk and covered in scales of brilliant green, slithered into the light. Its head swayed blindly, waiting.
"A bit too large for my purposes," Elijah remarked.
He tapped the creature with a masterful Shrinking Charm, its power drawn from parceltongue and the philosopher's stone.
Only a descendant of Slytherin could affect its resistant hide with magic.
The Great Serpent shrank until it was no thicker than a finger, winding itself up Elijah's arm to hide within his sleeve.
Elijah left the Chamber and ascended into a castle in chaos. McGonagall's voice, amplified by a Sonorus charm, echoed through the corridors: "All students return to your dormitories immediately. All teachers to the staff room."
He slipped into the stream of panicked students, blending perfectly into the crowd as they surged toward the towers. He followed the Gryffindors to the fat lady portrait, passing Percy Weasley, who was frantically counting heads.
Elijah slipped into the boys' dormitory unnoticed.
He found Harry Potter's trunk and pulled out the silvery, water-like fabric of the Invisibility Cloak. It was almost too easy. Shrouding himself in the Hallows' mist, he vanished.
He navigated the secret passages—the mirror on the fifth floor, the one-eyed witch on the fourth—and slipped out of the castle gates. He paused only to pluck a few Mandrake leaves from the greenhouses before reaching the Whomping Willow.
The sun was a dying ember on the horizon, casting long, golden shadows across the Black Lake. Elijah tapped the knot on the Willow's trunk, freezing its thrashing branches, and leaned against the bark to check the map one last time.
The teachers were dispersing. McGonagall was leading the Weasleys to her office. And there, finally, Dumbledore's name appeared—entering McGonagall's office alongside Molly and Arthur.
At the same time, the dots for Harry, Ron, and Lockhart vanished from the map near the second-floor lavatory.
"It's time," Elijah whispered. "Goodbye, Dumbledore."
He dropped into the hidden tunnel beneath the tree. He walked until the path inclined, leading him toward the basement of the Shrieking Shack. He emerged into a room choked with dust and peeling wallpaper, the windows boarded tight against the world.
Elijah felt the cold victory of his escape—until he looked toward the window.
There, silhouetted against the moonlight, stood an old man with a long white beard.
Dumbledore.
Elijah's blood turned to ice. He looked down at the Marauder's Map in his shaking hands. The ink clearly showed Albus Dumbledore in McGonagall's office, miles away.
He looked back at the man by the window. There were two of them.