After Professor McGonagall led the Weasleys away, only Tver, Dumbledore, and Harry remained in the room.
Dumbledore set the Sorting Hat on the desk, then began examining the diary with great interest.
Harry felt a flutter of fear. This was Voldemort's.
"Professor Dumbledore, what are you going to do with the diary?"
"This?" Dumbledore gave the little book a shake. "What do you think we should do with it?"
"Destroy it!" Harry blurted.
The moment the words left his mouth, he realized how loud he'd been. In the quiet office, his voice sounded almost painfully sharp.
Dumbledore didn't mind in the slightest. He chuckled softly, as if Harry had given a very satisfactory answer.
"Quite right. I was planning to destroy it."
Tver nodded in understanding.
It seemed the Headmaster had already figured out what this thing was, and had no intention of trying to coax more information out of Riddle.
He knew it would be pointless.
Dumbledore, looking suddenly excited, walked over to Harry and placed the diary on the floor.
"Well then, interested in doing it yourself?" he asked, straightening up and looking at Harry with clear expectation.
"Me?" Harry pointed to himself with his free hand, bewildered. "How am I supposed to destroy it?"
"Before, there really wasn't a way. But if I'm not mistaken, the sword in your hand has absorbed Basilisk venom."
"Now, you can simply stab it with the sword and destroy the evil soul inside."
Dumbledore stepped aside, watching Harry with open encouragement.
Harry drew a deep breath. Truth be told, he'd been holding in a lot.
He'd been chased around all night, only for the Basilisk to be taken out effortlessly by Professor Fawley in the end. Grateful as he was for the professor's help, he still felt a bit bitter that he hadn't been able to take revenge on the Basilisk himself.
Now he finally had the chance to personally destroy another enemy.
A small smile tugged at Harry's lips.
He raised the sword high, shooting a quick, excited glance at Headmaster Dumbledore and Professor Fawley.
Then he brought it stabbing down with all his strength.
At once, his hand went numb from the force of the impact—the sword had slammed so hard into the floor that the recoil rattled his bones.
But it also drove clean through the diary, ripping open a jagged hole.
The gash looked almost like a mouth being forced open, and from it burst a screech so sharp it felt like it could tear straight through his eardrums.
At the same time, that "mouth" began to vomit out blood—thick streams of ink gushed wildly from the diary, spraying over Harry's hands and robes. The sword was drenched as if it had been caught in a downpour, ink running down the blade in heavy drops.
The diary's twisted, agonized screams went on and on, so long that Harry felt his ears had stopped working, the entire world narrowing to that one horrific sound.
And then, all at once, the screaming stopped.
Harry looked down.
Only a little ink was still seeping weakly from the "mouth" in the diary's cover.
Completely worn out, he pulled the sword free. Somehow, that one stab had left him more exhausted than his entire battle with the Basilisk in the Chamber.
His head was buzzing, faint and foggy.
"BANG!"
The violent crash of a door flying open snapped Harry out of it.
Lucius Malfoy stood in the doorway, staring in surprise at Harry's back, then eyeing Tver with a look of dark amusement.
Dobby stumbled in behind him, his huge, watery eyes wide with panic.
"Dumbledore?" Lucius snarled, barely containing his rage.
"I don't recall the Board ever voting to let you waltz back into Hogwarts on your own authority!"
He was shaking slightly with fury. The last time he'd been this unsettled was when the Dark Lord fell from power.
This had been his grand scheme of the year, and now, with Dumbledore back, it felt as if all his efforts had gone to waste.
"The Board didn't," Dumbledore replied calmly, "but its members did."
He straightened, confidence in every line of his posture, and stepped past Harry to stand directly before Lucius.
"The day after I left, Madam Shafik wrote to me herself, asking me to return to the castle."
Dumbledore advanced on Lucius one step at a time, his gaze as sharp as the sword still clutched in Harry's hand.
Under that pressure, Lucius was forced to retreat, step by step.
"I'll… I'll convene the Board and have her removed!" he shouted, the bluster in his voice barely covering the panic beneath it.
Dumbledore let out a soft, dismissive laugh.
"Indeed, someone on the Board is to be removed—but that someone is you."
"Tonight, I learned the Weasley children were also attacked. The other ten Board members have all written to me about your threats against them."
"Lucius, all eleven members of the Board have unanimously voted to dismiss you."
Lucius's face darkened at once.
"The attacks in the castle aren't over. Without me, how do you plan to resolve anything?"
Lucius had laid all his plans with the intention of using the diary to his advantage—waiting for the moment Dumbledore was forced from the school so he could swoop in as the savior.
He would gain the glory for stopping the attacks and seamlessly take the position of Headmaster; the Horcrux would absorb life force, rebuild a body, and begin its resurrection.
But this supposedly flawless plan had been sabotaged at every turn.
The Ministry and the Board suddenly had people opposing him, even the newspapers refused to take his side. And after Rita disappeared, many reporters assumed she'd been threatened and, out of solidarity, began attacking the Ministry as well.
The problem was—he hadn't even found a single hair of Rita Skeeter!
Fudge was an idiot too, unable to handle the pressure and dumping the blame onto him in front of the media.
As if he could handle it better?!
Now, the monster in the Chamber was his last hope.
All he needed was to announce that he, Lucius Malfoy, had resolved the Chamber of Secrets incident, and everything would fall into place.
At that thought, relief flickered through his chest.
Horcruxes—he'd been terrified when he first discovered what they were. Who could possibly have anticipated involvement in something like this?
"You needn't trouble yourself about any of that," Dumbledore said, stretching out a hand toward Harry. "We've already taken care of all the dangerous pieces—"
He didn't look back, but Harry knew exactly what he meant.
With a slight grimace, Harry glanced at the diary lying on the floor, its cover punctured, ink still trickling out. He didn't even notice how badly his robes were stained.
He pinched the corner, lifted it, and placed it in Dumbledore's waiting hand.
"See?" Dumbledore held the diary right up before Lucius's face, droplets of ink splashing onto Lucius's clothes. "The culprit has been dealt with."
Lucius was too furious to speak.
His cheeks puffed with rage, his eyes bulging like a startled toad. If not for years of polished manners, he would have started shouting.
Catching Dobby's frantic winks, Harry suddenly said, "Mr. Malfoy, you're the one who slipped the diary to Ginny, weren't you? During the summer holiday."
Lucius's eyes flickered, but he still lifted his chin proudly.
"And your evidence?"
Dumbledore moved smoothly between them.
"We have no evidence, of course."
"But if Arthur were to learn that it truly was you who placed such an object in his daughter's hands, I doubt he'd mind spending another summer on your estate."
Lucius's pride shattered again. His eye twitched, and he glared at Dumbledore for several long seconds.
Dumbledore met the glare without flinching; he even smiled lightly.
Lucius realized then that his year-long scheme had completely collapsed on him. Enraged, he spun around and stormed toward the door.
"Dobby. We're leaving."
Seeing Dobby's reluctant expression, Harry's eyes brightened.
"Professor, may I return the diary to Mr. Malfoy?"
"Of course."
Dumbledore handed it to him cheerfully and watched as Harry sprinted after the retreating Lucius.
The room fell suddenly quiet, leaving only Dumbledore and Tver—who had been watching the whole scene—standing in an odd, lingering silence.
...
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