Right Now Could Last Forever

On Sunday morning, Harry came rushing down into the Great Hall. Hermione and I had been having breakfast with Ginny, but we quickly finished eating and followed him out onto the grounds. Harry told us everything about what Hagrid and Sirius has both wanted. Hermione and I both agreed that the dragons were a very deadly threat, obviously, but I couldn’t agree with them about Karkaroff.

“Let’s just try and keep you alive until Tuesday evening,” I said, “and then we can worry about Karkaroff.”

We walked three times around the lake, trying all the way to think of a simple spell that would subdue a dragon. Nothing whatsoever occurred to us, so we retired to the library instead. Here, Harry pulled down every book he could find on dragons, and the three of us set to work searching through the large pile.

“Talon-clipping by charms... treating scale rot... this is no good, this is for nutters like Hagrid who want to keep them healthy...”

“Dragons are extremely difficult to slay, owing to the ancient magic that imbues their thick hides, which none but the most powerful spells can penetrate... but Sirius said a simple one would do it...”

“Let’s try some simple spellbooks, then,” said Harry, throwing aside ‘Men Who Love Dragons Too Much’.

He returned to the table with a pile of spellbooks, set them down and began to flick through each in turn. Hermione whispering non-stop at his elbow.

“I can’t look at another book ever again,” I said, with a loud sigh. “I have a huge headache; I think I’ll just head back to the common room.”

After short byes, I left the pair up to their research. Studying had never been a thing that I could do for very long, even if Harry’s life was on the line; I knew that Hermione would figure something out anyway.

I walked the halls of the basically empty school. It was Sunday so everyone was either studying or hanging out with friends from other houses. I shoved my hands into the pockets of my jeans and smiled ‘sweetly’ at a pair of first year Hufflepuffs, who I remembered foggily from the Sorting.

In the common room, I found Ron sitting sourly by himself; his wizard chess set in front of him.

“Hey, Ronald,” I said, sitting in the chair opposite him. “How’s it going?”

Ron mumbled something inaudible, and placed his head on his arms.

“That bad huh?” He grunted in response. “Do you want to play a game then?” I said, picking up one of the black pieces in front of me and putting it on the board.

“I suppose,” Ron said, lifting his head and organising this pieces.

“You miss him, huh?” I said, in the middle of our game.

“Of course not,” Ron said, but it was obvious that he did miss Harry. I sighed but didn’t press the matter any further.

--

The day of the First Task, lessons were to stop at midday, giving all the students enough time to the dragon’s enclosure – though none of them knew there would be dragons.
Harry was very distant all morning, and I was getting rather worried that he would freeze when the time came to face the dragon. When McGonagall rushed over to him in the Great Hall, I could see the obvious nervousness on his face.

“Potter, the champions have to come down into the grounds now... you have to get ready for your first task.”

“OK,” said Harry, standing up, his fork falling onto his plate with a clatter.

“Good luck, Harry,” Hermione whispered. “You’ll be fine!”

“Yeah,” said Harry.

“Poor guy,” Fred said, next to me.

“Looks as white as a ghost,” George commented.

“He’ll make it through,” I said, confident that Harry had master the summoning charm Hermione and I had helped him with the night before. “Don’t worry.”

-

“Look at that!” Bagman yelled. “Will you look at that! Our youngest champion is quickest to get his egg! Well, this is going to shorten the odds on Mr Potter!”

Dragon-keepers rushed forward to subdue the Horntail.

“Um, Samuels?” Fred said next to me.

“Mmm?”

“Can I have my hand back now?” the red head said with a cheeky grin.

“Oh,” I hadn’t even realised that I’d grabbed his hand. I loosened my tight grip on his hand, and smiled shyly up at Fred. “Sorry.”

“It’s OK,” Fred chuckled, ruffling my hair with his other hand.

“I’m going to go check on Harry,” I said, and Hermione nodded in agreement next to me.
We pushed our way through the crowd, which was still screaming and cheering.

“Do you mind if I come with you?” A familiar voice said.

I turned and saw Ron standing, watching me and Hermione make stumble out of the some-what tightly compacted bodies.

“Of course not!” Hermione said.

We made our way to the mouth of the tent, where we found Harry.

“Harry, you were brilliant!” Hermione said squeakily. There were fingernail marks on her face where she had been clutching it in fear. “You were amazing! You really were!”

“Harry, Ron said, very seriously, “whoever put your name in that Goblet – I – I reckon they’re trying to do you in!”

“Caught on, have you?” Harry said coldly. “Took you long enough.”

Hermione and I stood nervously between them, looking from one to the other. Ron opened his mouth uncertainly.

“It’s OK,” Harry said, before Ron could get the words out. “Forget it.”

“No,” said Ron, “I shouldn’t’ve –“

“Forget it,” Harry said.

Ron grinned nervously at him, and Harry grinned back.

Hermione burst into tears.

“There’s nothing to cry about!” I told her.

“You two are so stupid!” she shouted at Harry and Ron, stamping her foot on the ground, tears splashing down her front. Then, before either of them could stop her, she had given both of them a hug, and dashed away, now positively howling.

“Barking,” said Ron, shaking his head.

“Harry, c’mon, they’ll be putting up your scores...”

I picked up the golden egg and Harry his Firebolt, and the three of us ducked out of the tent.

“You were the best, you know, no competition. Cedric did this weird thing where he Transfigured a rock on the ground... turned it into a dog... he was trying to make the dragon go for the dog instead of him. Well, it was a pretty cool bit of Transfiguration , and it sort of worked, because he did get the egg, but he got burnt as well – the dragon changed its mind halfway through and decided it would rather have him than the Labrador, he only just got away. And that Fleur girl tried this sort of charm, I think she was trying to put it into a trance – well, that kind of worked, too, it went all sleepy, but then it snored, and this great jet of flame shot out, and her shirt caught fire – she put it out with a bit of water out of her wand. And Krum – you won’t believe this, but he didn’t even think of flying! He was probably the best after you, though. Hit it with some sort of spell right in the eye. Only thing is, it went trampling around in agony and squashed half the real eggs – they took marks off for that, he wasn’t supposed to do any damage to them.”

Ron drew breath, and I laughed lightly, as we reached the edge of the enclosure. I noticed Harry watching the five judges, who were sitting right at the other end, in raised seats draped in gold.

“It’s marks out of ten from each,” I said, just as Madame Maxime raised her wand in the air. What looked like a long, sliver ribbon shot out of it, which twisted itself into a long figure eight. “Not bad!” I said, as the crowd applauded. “I suppose she took marks off for your shoulder...”

Mr Crouch came next. He shot a number nine into the air.

“Looking good!” Ron yelled, thumping Harry on the back.

Next, Dumbledore. He, too, put up a nine. The crowd were cheering harder than ever.

Ludo Bagman – ten.

“Ten?” said Harry in disbelief. “But... I got hurt... what’s he playing at?”

“Harry, don’t complain!” I yelled excitedly.

And now Karkaroff raised his wand. He paused for a moment, and then a number shot out of his wand, too – four.

“What?” Ron bellowed furiously. “Four? You lousy biased scumbag, you gave Krum ten!”
I felt a lot of my respect for Karkaroff slowly seep away; it wasn’t fair for him to have given Krum such a high score, when Harry obviously did a better job. There weren’t only Gryffindors cheering in the crowd, however. When it had come to it, when they had seen what he was facing, most of the school had been on Harry’s side, as well as Cedric’s.

“You’re tied in first place, Harry! You and Krum!” said Charlie Weasley, hurrying to meet us as we set off back towards the school. “Listen, I’ve got to run, I’ve got to go and send Mum an owl, I swore I’d tell her what happened – but that was unbelievable! Oh yeah – and they told me to tell you you’ve got to hang around a few more minutes... Bagman wants a word, back in the champions’ tent.”

Ron and I waited for Harry, and when he returned, we started to walk back around the edge of the Forest, talking hard; Harry wanted to hear what the other champions had done in more detail. Then, as we rounded a clump of trees, a witch leapt out from behind us. I immediately pulled out my wand.

It was Rita Skeeter. She was wearing acid-green robes today; a Quick-Quotes Quill in her hand that blended perfectly against them.

“Congratulations, Harry!” she said, beaming at him. “I wonder if you could give me a quick word? How you felt facing that dragon? How you feel now about the fairness of the scoring?”

“Yeah, you can have a word,” said Harry savagely.

“Goodbye,” I finished for him, my wand still pointed at her.

And we set off back to the castle.