Chapter 105: Rat Blood

Can a basilisk take murder appointments? 

If no one's guiding it, it could easily hit the wrong target during an attack—maybe even a professor or some random student. Voldemort's not *that* dumb. He rarely goes after pure-bloods; he's not as extreme as Cohen, after all. Plus, Salazar Slytherin must've given the basilisk strict orders—like no slaughtering students willy-nilly. The old guy was a pure-blood nutcase, not a serial killer.

"What's that noise?!" Harry perked up, noticing Cohen scanning the area too. "Cohen? You hear it too?"

"Yeah," Cohen said, not bothering to lie. With the basilisk on the move and Voldemort plotting to frame him, he needed Harry on his side. If things got messy and his name couldn't be cleared, dragging the main character down with him was the safest bet—Dumbledore wouldn't suspect Harry, which meant Cohen would be in the clear too.

"What're you guys hearing?" Ron asked, swatting away three pesky house-elves buzzing around him.

"It's like… it's looking for something?" Harry said, puzzled. "I don't really get it—the sound's kinda creepy…"

Cohen wanted to track where the noise was headed, but those elves were way too loud. 

So, he raised his wand toward the ceiling, muttering a few words like it was some spell. In reality, he just sucked the souls right out of the elves around them. 

One by one, they dropped to the floor, crawling around in a daze.

"What spell was *that*?!" Hermione gasped, her curiosity instantly piqued.

"Something Lockhart mentioned earlier," Cohen lied smoothly. "Works great on house-elves."

With a flick of his wand, he used a Levitation Charm to toss the soulless elves back into a cage, kindly covering it with a cloth. 

"We'll give 'em back later," he said.

**[Leave a mark… leave a mark…]**

The basilisk's voice slithered off in another direction—toward a different corridor on the third floor. 

Harry held his breath, listening intently, his eyes tracking the sound.

"Have you two lost it?" Ron asked, eyeing Cohen and Harry with concern. The hallway was dead quiet, yet they were both straining to hear something.

"Hang on—" Harry brushed off Ron's question. "Listen closer…"

**[Blood… blood'll do… where's the blood…]**

"Blood?" Harry's eyes widened in panic.

"Let's go!" 

Cohen grabbed Harry and bolted out the door. Going alone would look suspicious, but with Harry in tow? Totally different story. Harry had his mom's sacrificial protection charm—should be fine.

*Drag 'em all into the mess!* 

"Wait for us!" Ron and Hermione shouted, abandoning their bags to scramble after Cohen and Harry.

The basilisk's voice echoed through the walls, leading to an empty corridor—it seemed to be dodging crowds. Snakes can sense heat, so it was probably picking spots with no students around.

They hit a corner where a heavy door stood in their way. Opening it would take too long, and the basilisk had already left the walls.

**[Blood… blood…]**

On top of the basilisk's muttering, there was a faint scraping sound—like something brushing against the stone.

*Bam!* 

Cohen didn't bother with the door. He blasted it open with a spell, the wood splintering apart with a loud crash.

He caught a glimpse of a snake tail vanishing into the wall. Harry, a step behind, nearly got yanked off his feet by Cohen's momentum.

The spot where the basilisk disappeared was solid stone—proof Hogwarts' walls could shift. No wonder the thing could pop out of pipes whenever it wanted.

Cohen led Harry to the spot where it vanished, and there it was: "blood."

"Rats?" 

Harry stared, confused, at two dead gray rats on the floor. Their blood pooled together, surrounded by thin streaks—like someone had dipped a quill in it to write something.

"Over here," Cohen said, looking up at the wall. The basilisk could freaking *write*. Only Slytherin's pet would pull something this extra.

**[Where are you]** 

"What's that supposed to mean?" Harry's racing heart skipped a beat, the whole thing feeling almost ridiculous.

After all that tension, someone—or something—used rat blood to scribble "Where are you"? 

"You guys ran *way* too fast!" 

Hermione and Ron finally caught up, panting. 

"What happened?" Hermione asked, clutching her chest. Then she saw the rat corpses and the writing. "Don't tell me you sprinted all the way here just to kill two rats and write on the wall with their blood. That's so childish."

"Rats?!" Ron yelped, glancing at the bodies in a panic—probably worried it was Scabbers.

"It's not Scabbers, and it wasn't us," Harry explained to Ron and Hermione. "Cohen and I heard something in the walls—wait, you didn't hear it?"

"Hear what?" Hermione asked, baffled. "Ron and I didn't hear anything. We just saw you two take off like maniacs—"

"It said 'where are you' and 'blood,'" Harry recalled. "I thought someone was about to attack—Cohen probably thought the same, right?"

"Yeah," Cohen nodded. "But…" 

His gaze dropped to the two plump rats. 

"We didn't expect the victims to be rodents."

"Maybe it's someone's prank," Hermione suggested. "Though it's a bit gory. Filch is gonna flip when he sees this—we—"

"You lot should've known better than to mess up the corridor floors, hmm?" Filch's creepy voice slithered up behind them. His cat, Mrs. Norris, spotted the rat corpses and darted over, snatching them up in her jaws.

No surprise—they all got detention.

"We *already* had one detention lined up!" Ron fumed as they trudged back to the common room.

"He doesn't even have proof," Hermione muttered, annoyed. It was her first detention ever, and over something she didn't even do.

"Two detentions or one, what's the difference?" Harry said absently, still distracted by the voice and the bloody message.

"I'm going to bed," Cohen said, waving goodbye to the trio.

"It's only three-thirty!" Ron said, confused. "We could go see Hagrid— isn't it kinda early to sleep?"

"Nah," Cohen shook his head. "I'm wiped. Catch you at the feast."

He needed to check on Lockhart ASAP.

This basilisk stunt didn't feel like Voldemort's style—why would he bother killing rats? 

And that message on the wall… 

"Where are you?" 

Cohen mumbled to himself. 

Who was the basilisk looking for? 

Not him, right?

*(End of Chapter)*