Salazar's last defense

"Legilimens" he said before entering Penelope mind and slammed against her shields softly.

It would not be good if he used all his powers in the attack as he would simply break through her shields at that point.

Purebloods, by rule, always practice Occlumency in order to hide the secrets of their families from other people.

Of the five death eaters he captured over this summer, four of them were quite proficient in this art which came as a surprise to him as he had earlier thought that not many people knew occlumency.

Well, live and learn.

But regardless of whatever he thought, the presence of four occlumens at hand gave him the chance to practice legilimency as he wished.

So he entered their mind and broke their shields again and again and again, sharpening his legilimency probes at each practice session.

Of course, whoever he chose to practice on suffered severe headache after those sessions but that was not his problem to begin with. A simple pepper up potion along with a dreamless sleep potion put them out of their misery for the next few hours after which they would wake up feeling like they have a bad hangover and nothing else.

By the end of the winter holiday, he had become so good at the mind art that he was able to slip inside their minds most of the time by bypassing their occlumency shields without them even having any idea about it.

That was how he was able to bypass Daphne's shields so easily.

He could have easily demolished her shields if he wanted to do so but doing so would leave her with severe headache and he didn't want that problem in his hand so he simply entered her mind by bypassing her immature and weak shields.

Doing so would also make her realize just how dangerous he truly was.

He knew not to trust her the moment she entered the room and the memories he found in her mind seemed to support his point as well.

He shook those thoughts from his mind and tried to find the weakness in Penelope's mind. And yes, there were many gaps in her shields from where he could enter her mind. Plus there was the fact that her shields were not that strong in the first place.

And if someone like him could find so many weaknesses in her defense then someone like Dumbledore would find reading her surface thoughts a piece of cake despite her shields.

For now the their best defense would be to not meet Dumbledore's or Snape's eyes at all.

Regardless, he continued to pelt her weak points with his probe in a gentle manner.

Practicing in such a gentle manner would leave her with a mild headache by the end of the session but it was the only way he knew to increase the quality of their shields in a short amount of time.

After he had given her shields a good battering, he finally left her mind and gave her a faint nod.

Then he looked at Hermione who gazed back at him with a determined expression and dove into her mind as well.

After a few minutes, he came out of her mind with a genuinely satisfied smile. It seemed like Hermione had worked hard on her shields during the holiday.

"Penelope. You still need to work a bit more on your shields." He said with an apologetic expression. She had become a good friend over the past few months and he didn't want to upset her by being seen as doing something partial.

"I understand." She said with a kind expression "And I don't mind if you can't share your secrets with us right now. Just because you can't tell me your secrets until I'm strong enough to protect myself won't change our friendship." She finished her words with a hug which he returned.

Hugging Hermione was the best as she was just so small and cute but hugging Penelope was quite good as well.

She gave him an elderly sister feeling which was something that he liked quite a bit.

"Very well then. We'll see you later." He said and after bidding her goodbye, he took Hermione's hand and led her through many secret passageways.

The reason why he did so was to make sure that no one would follow them to where he was about to go right now.

"Where are we going Harry?" Hermione asked as he finally came out from a secret passageway behind a large tapestry.

"Do you remember the friend who gave me the fresh Basilisk skin?" he asked at at her nod he continued "We're going to meet that friend of mine right now."

The smirk in his lips must have definitely unsettled Hermione because she suddenly looked rather unsure about this whole endeavor.

"Come on Mione. Don't you trust me." He asked her, giving her hand a gentle nudge and her uncertain looked evaporated at once.

"Of course I do Harry." She said with a smile and he gave her one last nod before they entered the abandoned girl's bathroom on the first floor.

"Harry, are you sure this is the correct place?" she asked as she looked at the bathroom. "I mean…"

"I know." He said and remembered the ghost that he exorcised not long ago. He would usually bribe Moaning Myrtle to keep his secret with a wink and a flower most of the times. But he knew that she would always be a security risk.

That was why he had removed her altogether before leaving for the winter break.

None of the students will miss her.

And the ghosts might notice her absence but he doubted that they would care either.

He pitied her for that and wondered if he had not done her a favor by exorcising her from such a miserable existence where she had no one to care about her.

Regardless, the bathroom had been in disuse for too long for it to be used properly anymore and no one came her even after he removed the ghost so this place was safe for now.

Still, there was no point in being careless so he checked the Marauder's map one last time before hissing at the sink.

"Harry. What are you doing?" Hermione asked, looking at him weirdly.

"Watch." He said and the very next moment, the sink moved aside to show a slide going underground.

He knew that saying 'Stairs' will bring stairs for him to use but he never bothered with it.

Not since he bought the brooms and charmed his Robe to fly since he could easily fly in and out of the tunnel.

"Ready for a Slide Hermione." He said with a dark smile and she flipped her head and look at him with fear. "You wouldn't?" she pleaded and his smirk became even more pronounced before he held her by her waist and jumped down the slide despite her protests with a "woooohoooo." while she screamed in fear beside him.

"I hate you." She said as they reached the bottom of the slide.

"No you don't." He said with a self satisfied smirk and let go of her waist so that she could stand up on her own.

Not long after he bonded with Bitty, he told her to clean this whole area along with the slide during her free time and she had done a wonderful job of it.

There was not even a speck of dirt in the whole area let alone the graveyard full of bones that this place once used to have.

He had also added a cushioning charm under the entrance of the slide so that he would not get any scratches upon landing on the ground.

Hermione stepped away from him with a huff and he had a feeling that she was about to berate him but then she looked around the area and got lost in herself.

"Where are we?" she asked, looking at the dark underground area that was barely lit with some light coming from around the other tunnels.

And indeed, she had a reason to be surprised as this was perhaps the lowest level in Hogwarts.

"This place is known as the Chamber of Secrets." He explained as took her hands in order to comfort her.

"Chamber of Secrets?" she asked.

"Yup. Created by Salazar Slytherin as the last line of defense for Hogwarts students if a war ever broke out in the wizarding world and Hogwarts' other defenses failed." He replied.

And it was the truth as well.

If you ignore the fact that Salazar had ordered Besalla to only protect the purebloods and not the muggleborns. He was against the idea of Muggleborns attending the school after all.

But it could be said that his worries were not unfounded as during those days, events like burning of wizards and witches were common occurrence where anyone who was found to be doing any accidental magic was captured by the people and burned on the stake.

Salazar didn't wanted any muggleborns to attend the school because he believed that their presence will only endanger their society to the muggles and nothing more.

And when his beliefs clashed with that of the other three founders, he simply left because he believed that this place will fall sooner or later because of their kindness and stupidity.

A pity that his words are nowadays twisted and used by Dark Lords as a sign that they should attack the muggles and whatnot.

"Really?" Hermione asked, looking skeptical of the claim and he shrugged.

"That's what I know at least."

He knew that talking anymore about this topic might lead to an argument with Hermione and if he'd learned anything over the past few months then it was that arguing with her would just be a waste of time for both of them.

"So… if Hogwarts was breached then… students were supposed to hide here?" she asked skeptically.

"Yes." He replied "Or at least that's why he made this place. But he never told many people about it's existence and since this place was never truly used for it's express purpose, people simply forgot about it's existence and it faded into the legends."

Hermione still looked a bit skeptical but at least she didn't question him anymore.

"And your friend meets you here?" she asked.

"No. My friend lives here." He said with a smirk.

She froze at that and shook her head "Yeah right. What is you friend, a goblin?" she asked sarcastically.

"No. Not goblin." He said and opened the door leading to the main part of the chamber of secrets where Harry had fought the Basilisk and Hermione froze.

You don't get to see Salazar's handiwork every day after all.

"Harry… Is that a…" she asked, her voice filled with fear.

"Yes." He replied calmly and squeezed her hand once more "Hermione. Meet Besalla. Salazar's last defense of Hogwarts."

Author's Note:- Be honest, how many of you guys thought that he would kill the Basilisk.

Personally, I believe that without the corrupting influence of Voldemort, any Parselmouth would have had a fair chance of being the Basilisk's friend since snakes are generally inclined to listen to Parselmouths and the Basilisk would be rather lonely after having no one to talk with for more than 50 years.

Plus, I took the liberty to name our 1000 year old resident snake, Besalla.

Of course, the only reason he showed Hermione the Basilisk was because of her strong Occlumency shields. Since Penelope's shields were far weaker, he didn't show her this secret.

Hope you like the chapter.

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