Chamber Of Secrets

“It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.” Albus Dumbledore.

The second installment for the Harry Potter Universe is The Chamber Of Secrets. The book starts off with Harry still at home with the Dursley’s. Nor Ron or Hermonie have written to him all holidays which makes Harry a little upset, he can’t vent to anyone in the Dursley’s as they forbid anything magical. His uncle Vernon warns him that he has a big potential deal coming up for his job at Grunnings Drill Manufacturing Company.that could lead to a promotion. Veron warns Harry that he should stay up in his room otherwise he would probably spoil the dinner and evening then the potential promotion. So Harry goes to spend the evening in his room. However, when he enters his room he is greeted by a creature with two large green eyes, large bat like ears and a pillow case as clothes. The creature explains that his name is Dobby the house elf. Dobby tries to convince that Harry shouldn’t go back to Hogwarts this year as there is a plot that is extremely dangerous to the students. Harry protests saying that Hogwarts is his home and all his friends are there. Dobby then replies with friends that don’t even write to Harry Potter. Harry realizes that this elf shouldn’t know that and finds all of his friends letter’s in Dobby’s clothes. Harry tries to snatch the letters but Dobby runs out of his room and down the stairs to where the Dursley’s and the meeting is being held. Dobby pleads with Harry one last time to not go back to Hogwarts but he still refuses. Dobby clicks his fingers and the grand cake that Aunt Petunia was making earlier levitates over towards to meeting. Harry helpless stops frozen not knowing what to do. Dobby then clicks his fingers again and the cake drops on the lady’s head ruining the evening and Vernon’s promotion. As punishment Harry becomes a prisoner to his room with bars added to his window. Harry wakes one night by the sound of an engine only to be shocked that the car is flying in the sky rather than on the road, he cant be more pleased to see that it is his friend Ron and his older identical twins Fred and George. They tell him to gather all of his stuff for school and then break Harry out of his own home. They fly back to the Burrow in Arthur Weasley’s enchanted car.

Early the next morning they arrive at The Burrow and Harry spends a few days there until they need to gather their school books at Flourish & Blotts. Here they meet their new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, Professor Lockhart at a book signing. At the store Harry, Hermonie and the Weasley kids have an altercation with Lucuis Malfoy. Lucius takes Ginny’s (the youngest Weasley) book and points out the tacky look of the book. He then replaces it subtly with another book that only Harry catches a glimpse of but doesn’t think much of it. September 1st rolls around and Harry is off with the Weasley’s to Kings Cross Station. They take the enchanted car to the station and everyone goes though the brick wall of platform 9 and three quarters. Harry and Ron are the last to go trough the barrier but as they run towards it and embarrassingly crash into they realise the barrier is now shut and they missed the deadline of 11 o’clock. Harry suggests that they wait in the car for Ron’s parents to come back. This, however, gives Ron the idea to use the car to catch up to the train and follow it to Hogwarts. While flying over London a few Muggles witnessed the flying car and were thoroughly confused. They find the train and follow it to Hogwarts. Once they arrive they struggle to land the faulty car back on the ground  and crash into the tree. The tree starts creaking and the massive branches start swinging and hitting the car, they finally fall out of the tree and narrowly escape being crushed by the Whomping Willow. This is a tree that has been on the Hogwarts grounds for decades and has a deadly consequences for anyone who gets to close. Once the car falls out of the tree they drive just out of reach, the car doors and boot all open throwing Harry, Ron and all their luggage onto the ground and then drives off into the Forbidden Forest. They both gather all of their stuff and head into the castle to begin lessons tomorrow as they have missed the feast.

The car in the Whomping Willow

Harry is explained to that he will serve detention for the Willow incident and it will be with Lockhart signing fan mail. Harry begins to hear voices in the walls while he is with Lockhart doing his detention. He doesn’t think much more of it and he is sent to go to be as it’s late.Their first lesson is Defence Against the Dark Arts with their new teacher. Professor Lockhart. He explains that their first lesson is about Cornsih Pixies, once he lets them out of the cage they cause havoc and destroy pretty much the whole classroom. Lockhart, not knowing what to do to get them back in the cage, abandons the classroom into his office. Hermonie, however. being the genius that she is casts a spell that immobilises all the pixies in the air. Weeks pass and the trio have managed to stat out of trouble, they have been attending their classes and getting along fine. The trio are off to another class when Harry hears the voices in the walls again, he can hear it moving along corridors so being Harry he follows it and so do Ron and Hermonie. They find water on the floor flooding the girls bathroom. In the reflection of the water they see writing, they look up on the wall and a message is written in blood saying, “The chamber of secrets have been open, enemy of the heir beware”. Draco then says you’ll be next mudbloods. Mr Filch, the caretaker, has a cat called Mrs. Norris who is hanging still and cold. Teachers start to arrive and so does the school. Dumbledore diagnoses that Mrs. Norris has been petrified and that Professor Sprout has Mandrake plants that can return the petrifies back to their original state. Lockhart claims that he has knew the spell that could have saved Mrs. Norris. Another Defecne Against the Dark Arts class takes place and it involves learning how to properly duel. Lockhart asks two students to volunteer after a demonstration is shown by him and Professor Snape. The professors run through the steps and then finally duel. Snape easily wins each time with Lockhart seemingly not knowing what to do. He quickly recovers and says that it was pretty obvious what he was going to do. Harry is chosen by Lockhart to perform a duel and Snape picks Draco because he is from Slytherin with Snape is the head of. Having being enemies the duel turns ugly quickly and instead of only disarming they begin to try and harm each other. Draco casts a spell that creates a snake that is sent to attack another student. Harry starts speaking to the snake to call it off but he starts speaking a different language. Snape then gets rid of the snake but not before Lockhart tried to get rid of it himself. All Lockhart does is toss it up into the air, it’s not until Snape steps in that the snake is destroyed. After class Hermonie , Ron and Harry all move onto the next class when Ron says that Harry is a Parsletongue. He explains further that only a few people on earth can speak to snakes and Voldemort was one of them along with other people who are descendants of Salazar Slytherin the founder of Slytherin.

A Qudditch match had taken place in the mean time and Harry was injured by a rogue blugder and broke his arm. All the teachers and students come to aid Harry and Lockhart insists that he can fix a broken arm in a heartbeat. Harry realizing Lockhart’s poor track record refuses but Lockhart does it anyway. He casts the spell and Harry’s arm flops, he is eventually taken to the hospital wing after Lockhart removed all his bones in his arm. Harry spends a few nights in the hospital wing when he is woken up during the middle of the night by cold voices that seem to be running along the walls saying kill repeatedly. Suddenly Dobby appears at the foot of his bed all cheerful as always. He explains that he is the reason that the barrier at 9 and three quarters shut early and Dobby sent the rogue bludger after Harry. This is because Dobby cares for Harry and he wants him to leave Hogwarts. He explains that its not safe anymore and that history id going to repeat itself. Dobby vanishes before Harry can ask anymore questions because someone just arrived in the hospital wing. It was Colin Creevy who is a first year obsessed with Harry. Dumbledore and Professor McGonagall is with him. Colin seems to be frozen and Dumbledore says that another attack has happened and he to is petrified. Harry starts to think of Dobby’s warning to see if they’re related. A Transfiguration class rolls around and Hermonie being curious asks Professor McGonagall about The Chamber Of Secrets. She explains that centuries ago that there are rumors of a monster that lives in the castle to purge the school of mud bloods or half-bloods. When Salazar co-founded the school he believed that they should be more selective of who attended Hogwarts, leading to most Slytherins being bias towards pure-bloods. McGonagall also explains that a few decades ago the chamber was open again and the school was nearly shut down from all the attacks as one girl died. The trio try to think of who could be opening the Chamber this time around and they come to the conclusion of Draco. He comes from a long line of Slytherins and also what he said when the chamber was open. Hermonie comes up with a plan to sneak into the Slytherin Common Room to ask Malfoy some question. She explains that they would have to make a potion called the Polyjiuce Potion which will take a month the finish. At the end of each day they go and tend to the potion in the girls bathroom. This bathroom is never used because of the ghost that haunts it, Moaning Murtle. She has been at Hogwarts for ages and gets a little annoying. A month passes and each of the trio have collected a hair from Slytherins they will turn into. They all drink the potion and Harry turns into Goyle, Ron into Crabbe and Hermonie was meant to turn into Millicent Bullstrode but accidently got a cat hair from her robe instead. Only Ron and Harry went to interrogate Malfoy in the common room. They only find out that Malfoy isn’t opening the chamber and he has no idea either. Another Quidditch match rolls around but has been cancelled. Professor McGonagall explains that Harry and Ron need to follow her to the hospital wing. Hermonie has been petrified and was found with a mirror. The Mandrake hasn’t been made yet so she was to remain petrified until they’re ready. Harry and Ron are left to solve this mystery, they walk along the corridor and see a trail of spiders all crawling in the same direction. Hagrid told them to follow the spiders if they see them before he was taken away to Azkaban. Hagrid was suspected to have opened the chamber of secrets again as he was framed when the first attacks has happening when he was at school.  They follow the spiders which lead them to the Forbidden Forest. After walking through the forest for a long time they finally come to a clearing. An Acromantuala appears called Aragog. He explains that he is a friend of Hagrid and that the spiders are fleeing from a monster that is in the castle which also fits to the story. He also says that Hargid is innocent and Aragog isn’t the monster that they thought was attacking all the muggle-born. They return to the castle and continue on with trying to solve the mystery alone.

One afternoon they find that the bathroom has been flooded again but the cause of the flooding was a book that had no name or anything on it. Days pass not knowing who this book belongs to but Neville finds Harry and says that the book has been stolen. They go and visit Hermonie even though she is still petrified and clasped in her hand is a crumbled bit of paper. They open it and it says that there is a monster that spiders flee from, if it’s looked directly in the eye it has the power to kill. Harry explain to Ron that no one has died yet as Mrs. Norris seen it in the water and Hermonie with the mirror. The monster is called a Basilisk. Ron says that that is the reason Harry can hear it because it is a snake and Harry can speak Parsletongue. Hermonie also hand wrote on the paper that the snake has been getting around by the pipes. They both stumble upon the teachers that are talking quickly and hushed. They over hear that a girl has been taken into the chamber and it’s Ron’s sister Ginny. Immediately they go to Lockhart’s room to tell him that they know what the creature is. Lockhart has, however, packed up all his belongings and says that he needs to leave which doesn’t make sense as he has been saying that he has known where the creature is all along. Harry comes to the conclusion that he is a fraud but they threaten him to go to the chamber with them. They go to the girls bathroom and ask Myrtle of she is the mudblood that was attacked all those years ago and died. She says yes and that she seen a great big pair of yellow eyes by the sink. Harry speaks Parsletongue and it open leaving a hole where the sink would go. They all go down the chamber when Lockhart steals Ron’s broken wand from when it broke in the Whomping Willow. Lockhart explains that he is a fraud and that he is gifted with memory charms and steals other wizards achievements then wipes their memories. His spell backfires and he is thrown up into the roof of the chamber. Rocks all start falling blocking the route to the chamber, only Harry got through. Lockhart wakes and he has no idea who he is. Harry continues on and finds Ginny laying on the floor with the diary. A young boy appears and says she is nearly dead, he says that he is Tom Riddle and he is a memory preserved inside the diary. Ginny, being naïve spilled all her secrets into the diary allowing Tom to become stringer. He explains that when she dies he will be mortal again. Harry asks who Tom is and he explains that Tom Marvolo Riddle is an acronym for I am Lord Voldemort. He explains that it was him who opened the chamber of secrets as he is an heir of Slytherin and he has been controlling Ginny to continue his work. Voldemort wants to kill Harry so he tells the Basilisk to kill Harry, suddenly the phoenix from Dumbledores office comes down and drops the Sorting Hat. Fawks then claws out the eyes of the Basilisk so it is now blind and can’t kill Harry. In the Sorting Hat a sword appears, Harry quickly picks it up and stabs the Basilisk through the mouth. As he withdraws the sword a tooth rips Harry’s skin. He pulls the tooth out of his arm and goes back over to Ginny and the diary. Tom is growing stronger as Ginny is nearly dead. Harry uses his remaining energy to stab the diary with the Basilisk fang and the memory of Tom begins to fade and vanished. Ginny wakes suddenly safe and alive. Harry still being poisoned from the Basilisk venom is saved from Fawkes as the tears from a phoenix heals Basilisk venom. Fawkes carries all four people back up to the castle. Hagrid has been released from Azkaban and Ginny and Ron treated for their injuries. Harry takes the diary up to Dumbledore’s office to find Lucius and Dobby as Dobby is the Malfoy’s house servant. Dobby and Lucius leave and Harry takes the diary and catches up to Lucius. He says that Lucius is the one who put the diary in Ginny’s cauldron at the bookstore. Lucius steals the diary back and he throws it to Dobby. Harry tells Dobby to open the diary and he finds Harry’s sock. When a house elf is presented with clothing they become free. Lucius infuriated goes to kill Harry but Dobby saves him by casting a spell on Lucius.

The end of the term rolls around and Harry and Ron find Hermonie un-petrified along with the others. Another year at Hogwarts was come to a close. Harry says good bye to his friends once back on the platform of 9 and three quarters and returns to the Dursley’s house anticipating another year of adventure at Hogwarts.

 

Credit to Whomping Willow Image- harry-potter.net.pl

Credit to Feature Image- hp-lexicon.org

Credit to Chamber Image- movieuppic.blogspot.com

Credit to Polyjuice Potion Image- tumblr.com

Credit to Chamber of Secrets and Basilisk Image- pinterest.com