Brian silently followed the viper that had emerged from the box-once the snake had slithered all the way out, she swallowed the box whole, even performing a highly inconsiderate impromptu act of excretion in the water to make room. At the same time, his Voldemort radar went off again-that snake ought not to have been swimming around alive in the water; she ought to have been floating stiffly on its surface.
"Another Horcrux, and a living one at that..." Brian suppressed the impulse within him with practiced ease. He had previously discussed the possibility of living Horcruxes with Dumbledore, and they suspected Harry might be an example. As long as they captured this viper, they would have something to compare him against, allowing them to continue their research into "the connection between Harry and Horcruxes."
This certainly counted as an unexpected surprise. Brian had never imagined that the box was actually a sort of teleportation-based Portkey-one that could even bypass Hogwarts' restrictions on transportation. Needless to say, the box was immensely valuable, though it naturally paled considerably beside one of Voldemort's Horcruxes. Perhaps another qualifier ought to be added:
Yet another Horcrux delivered right to their door.
All right, first a diary, then a snake. Voldemort had sent two of his Horcruxes into Hogwarts in succession. Was his aim to open the Chamber of Secrets, obtain Harry Potter's blood, or both? Brian mentally compared the diary and the viper.
Although the snake was alive and the diary was an inanimate object, the feeling they gave Brian was remarkably similar, because the distinction between living creature and inanimate object seemed far less conspicuous in the face of Voldemort's inhabiting soul. Brian's preliminary judgment was that he felt this way because the fragments of Voldemort's soul residing within them were both extremely