Chapter 65: New Year's Eve

Ivan didn't remember how he left Dumbledore's office, he only knew that his back was covered in cold sweat.

Dumbledore was terrifying, he may have no malice towards me, but it's not a good feeling not being able to keep secrets.

Ivan set out to learn how to protect his mind.

At the moment, there was no one in the halls of the school except him, but he was in high spirits.

He didn't know who had told them, but all the portraits were talking about the Chamber of Secrets and all that had happened as if they had witnessed it themselves. When they saw Ivan, each portrait stopped him curiously, waiting for him to tell them in detail how he and Harry had defeated the basilisk.

Ivan ignored the portraits and went straight to the school hospital.

The next second, he heard a rustling sound and Dobby, the house elf, appeared in front of him.

"Sir, Dobby is free, Harry Potter has set me free, he had his master give Dobby a sock,", Dobby said in a sharp, piercing voice, his eyes wide open and tears falling from them.

"Congratulations, Dobby!" whispered Ivan, seeing that Dobby was wearing Harry's slimy, smelly socks on his right foot.

"Thank you!" Another loud choking sound came from Dobby's throat, "Sir, Dobby heard from Mrs. Granger that you had something to ask me."

"I have something to ask you," Ivan nodded and asked quickly, "Dobby, now that you're free, what are your plans for later?"

"Dobby has it all figured out, sir! Dobby likes to be free, but he also likes to work, and Dobby needs a job, and to be paid for it." The elf suddenly said, a little lost, "But it's difficult, sir! I'm afraid people don't want to pay Dobby for his work, it's not in keeping with the qualities of a house elf."

Dobby's voice was getting lower and lower, not at all the cheerfulness with which he had started.

"I have a job for you, if you like, I'll pay you. So, would you like it?"

Ivan had it all figured out, with 'Hogwarts Magic' was getting too big for them, and with the summer vacations just around the corner, he couldn't use magic as much as he did now, he needed the help of a full time wizard or intelligent magical being, and Dobby fit the bill.

A house elf might not be able to write articles, or edit or proofread them, but he was perfectly capable of other tasks such as news gathering and newspaper printing.

When Dobby heard that Ivan would pay him for his work, he cried tears of joy. Dobby stretched his arms around Ivan's waist and hugged him tightly. Ivan went from being Harry Potter's great friend to being as great as he was.

And so, Dobby became the first full-time employee of 'The Magic of Hogwarts'.

Considering the amount of work, Ivan planned to give him ten galleons and weekends off, but Dobby said that so much money and time off was a horrible thing. He negotiated with Ivan and the final salary was four galleons a month and a day off.

In addition to his work for the paper, he would also take on service as a servant. If Malfoy knew about this affair, he might faint from anger.

After finishing with Dobby, Ivan went to the school hospital and with the help of Madam Pomfrey's sleep option had a good night's sleep.

He didn't wake up until the next morning.

The bed Lockhart was in was empty, Ron told him that after the school found out that Lockhart was hit with a powerful dememorizing charm, he was sent directly to St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Illness and Injury.

Dumbledore had come to see them, but they decided not to wake Ivan. Looking at Harry's face, Ivan knew that Dumbledore must have spoken to him alone. The look on his face could only be described as brainwashed.

Other than that, Ron was back to normal and not as depressed as before.

The three of them had a delicious lunch, specially prepared by Madam Pomfrey, and Ron told the story of how he had been controlled by Tom Riddle. Harry told him all about the two battles in the common room and the Chamber of Secrets.

When Harry finished his story, Hermione, Colin and Ginny came into the hospital room.

They brought good news and bad news, the good news was that Dumbledore gave the three of them two hundred points at breakfast. This meant that Gryffindor won the house cup.

The bad news was that the exams and Quidditch match were cancelled, which made Hermione and Harry frustrated.

For both of them, this was very bad news.

The few people chatted for a while and when Ivan was about to tell them about the secret treasures left behind by the founding foursome, he saw Ron's rat, so he abruptly shut up. He couldn't let Peter Pettigrew find out about these things.

"Come and tell us, Ivan! What exactly did you find inside the Slytherin statue?", Ron said curiously.

"It was something to do with the basilisk, no big deal," Ivan said as he looked at the mouse, and decided to keep it a secret for now.

At dinner time, Cornelius Fudge arrived at the school with the Special Contribution Award and Hagrid's pardon, and Ivan asked Colin to take some pictures of them, asking Ron in particular to make sure the Scabbers Rat was in sight.

Filch took the trophy carefully to the trophy room and Ivan combined the photos with those of the basilisk that Colin took in the common room before writing an article about the Chamber of Secrets.

Besides the fact that the article was on the front page, the 'Prophet' would most likely be very interested in it.

It would be perfect if Fudge would take the diary to Azkaban for Sirius Black to see. It wouldn't be long before the Ministry of Magic would be busy with Black's escape.

The rest of the semester was quiet.

Hogwarts had returned to normal, with only a few minor changes: the Defense Against the Dark Arts class was cancelled, Lucius Malfoy was dismissed from the board, and Draco no longer acted like he owned the school. Draco instead had a sad face all day and seemed to be filled with resentment.

After the mandrakes matured and the students recovered, the newspaper 'Hogwarts Magic' returned to its normal sales numbers before the opening of the Chamber of Secrets, and Ivan now had to find a new attraction to replace the Lockhart novels.

He decided to write an introduction of Hagrid as he was harmed by the Chamber of Secrets many years ago.

For the novel section, Ivan decided to try to write one himself. He borrowed Lockhart's complete works from Hermione and imitated her handwriting and wrote a book called "Me and the Hogwarts Basilisk" which was unexpectedly successful, many fans wrote to him every day.

Luckily, Ivan found Dobby to help him, otherwise he would have been overwhelmed.

In the blink of an eye, the term was over and they were on their way home on the Hogwarts Express.

Ivan, Harry, Ron, Hermione, Hermione, Colin, Fred, George and Ginny were alone in the compartment and they made the most of the last few hours they were allowed to use magic before the vacations and Fred and George set off their last fireworks.

Ginny told them that Percy and Penelope, the head of Ravenclaw, were secretly dating and that she had seen them kissing in an empty classroom on Halloween night, which surprised everyone, but also explained why Ivan had the feeling that Ginny was hiding something from him, and why Percy had been so upset, upset and had run to the school hospital after Penelope had been petrified.

When the Hogwarts express slowed down, Harry wrote down the Dursleys' phone number, but Ivan doubted that Harry's aunt and uncle would be willing to take a call from a wizard.

As Harry was telling Ron, they would be furious if they found out that Harry had come back from the dead after nearly dying so many times.

As the train pulled into the platform, Ivan got up to get his luggage, touched his pocket to make sure the potion was there. This summer he had to learn to defend his mind and protect himself. He had a bitter smile on his face, it looked like the summer would be busy.