Chương 203: Chapter 200

While Harry and Dean were working on the Identifier Band, hundreds of feet below them in the deep dark belly of the Chamber of Secrets, a red-eyed girl calmly circled the unconscious body of one Argus Filch.

It had been a whole week since he had taken full possession of his host since the last time he had done so had almost proven too taxing on him. He really should have expected that though. Of course using the Imperius had proven to be more taxing, especially since it required the use of an organized mind, and his young host was quite lacking in that.

But the information that the Imperiused Professor Pomona Sprout had given him had proven to be more than worth it.

He had learned from her that contrary to popular belief, his Prime soul piece had not perished after all. It had been at this very school the last year.

He had also learned that the Headmaster believed that his Prime had fled to the forests of Albania, and had told Sprout that he would be going to look for him there after his suspension.

Foolish of the old fool really, to trust people with such weak minds.

But then again, Voldemort's memories had shown him that trusting untrustworthy people was the biggest weakness that Albus Dumbledore had.

So now, after he had finally regained enough strength to take over his host's body again, he had devised a plan to help his Prime out a little bit.

Pulling his wand out, he cast, "Sectumsempra," slicing open the squib's chest. With a few more waves, he stopped the blood and vanished some muscle, leaving behind a small cavity in the caretaker's body.

He dipped a hand into a robe pocket, pulling out a silver Diadem with an oval sapphire encrusted into it, which he gently placed on his host's head.

Steeling himself, he sent a small tendril of his magic to connect to the much more diminished piece of soul in the diadem. With a small flutter, consciousness in the ancient headpiece rose, and sensing a larger, more active portion of its soul nearby, waited for its command.

'Lead the squib to the Prime. Assist him in regaining his power,' he instructed, sending all the information he had on the Prime into the diadem.

The soul inside shuddered in obedience.

Pulling the diadem off of his head, he used his wand to cast a powerful dark compulsion charm on Filch before tying it to the Diadem, making sure that the squib would do everything the Diadem wanted it to without it needing to possess him.

Finally, he placed the diadem into the cavity that he had carved into the squib's chest and with a wave of his wand, fully healed it over, hiding the horcrux completely inside his body. Another few waves, and the man's torn clothes fixed themselves.

Filch's eyes snapped open, and he wordlessly rose to his feet before standing still, waiting for his command.

"Go," he said.

With a nod, Filch turned around and headed towards the side wall of the chamber. A circular passageway opened up in the stone wall, which Tom knew would lead out into the edge of the Forbidden Forest, from where the squib would be able to steal one of the school's thestrals for transportation.

Of course, he idly thought, he could go find the Prime himself after he himself gained a body, or maybe he could even send someone stronger than a squib, but in his less than humble opinion, if his Prime had grown so weak that he couldn't make do with the squib and one of its Horcruxes, then perhaps it didn't deserve to be the Prime any more.

Besides, squibs were easier to control, wouldn't be able to fight against a full possession, and no one at Hogwarts would really notice that he was missing until it was too late, so it wasn't all bad at all.

The stone wall closed behind the man's back, and he turned and headed towards the corner where the Draught of Restoration had been bubbling away silently.

It was almost completely done now and needed barely a day's of work to finish up. But for now, he needed to get to the library so nobody noticed his host missing. The next big step of his plan was only hours away, and until then, it was a waiting game.

Giving the potion a few stirs and adding the last batch of unicorn blood to it, he covered it with a lid, opened up a passage that led up to the third floor and headed into it, ducking to avoid the low entrance.

He exited behind a tapestry near the library corridor. Walking briskly into the library, he made his way over to a desk near the back, where he sat down before withdrawing his consciousness from his host's mind, leaving only a small tendril of magic connected to make sure that he could see and hear everything happening around her through her senses.

His host woke up a few seconds later, feeling groggy.

Her mind was full of confusion, he noted, before he quickly sent a small tendril and quashed the confusion down, leaving her with a sense of serene acceptance. She quietly walked over to a bookshelf, picked out a book and started reading it.

The next hour and a half saw nothing else happen since the library was mostly empty except for Madam Irma Pince.

Just as he was about to withdraw the tendril of consciousness he had left connected to his host, however, something interesting happened.

Hermione Granger walked into the library before heading straight into newspaper archives, looking entirely too shifty for herself. If there was any place in the school that the little mudblood wouldn't be acting shifty, it would be the library. Curiosity aroused, he gave a twist and a pull, and his own consciousness snapped right out of the diary and settled into Lisa's head.

Pushing himself up from the desk, he walked around the Charms shelf and quietly entered the archives section, trying to stay unseen. Granger was sitting cross-legged beside a box of old newspapers, ruffling through it, quietly, looking for something.