slytherin princess [1]

the yule ball and the first task

Catherine shakily made her way into the stands of the stadium. Pansy and she gripped each other extremely tightly. The two of them made their way over to Draco, Theo, and Blaise, who were with Cedric's friends. Draco stopped casually laughing at Potter's expense and rushed over to Catherine. He pulled her close against his side and kissed her temple.

"You know, he's going to be just fine. We have to worry about Potter more than him," he laughed into her ear.

Catherine barely managed a half-smile in return. They all lined up on the edge of the railing. Pansy and Catherine gripped on to each other for dear life as Draco kept Catherine's other hand in his.

Erick and Ryland walked over to her.

"Ced's going to be fine, Catherine. He's Cedric; he's your counterpart, just think, would you win?"

"Yes," came her automatic reply.

Ryland grinned, "Then so will Cedric."

The two boys kissed her cheeks simultaneously before going back over to Susan and Hannah, who shot her comforting smiles. Catherine was so nervous that she actually returned them. They both were shocked to not get a glare in return, causing them to slightly squeal.

Bagman announced that the first task would begin, and Cedric Diggory would be the first champion. His opponent was the Swedish Short-Snout.

Catherine held her breath and her friends' hands as he made his way out. However, Cedric did not waste any time. He quickly transfigured a rock into a dog that distracted the dragon. He then ran past it and swooped in to grab the golden egg.

Catherine cheered in delight and hugged Pansy tightly. Then, to her horror, the dragon noticed Cedric. It began to chase him. Cedric dogged the dragon and attempted to weave past it. However, just as Cedric was narrowly escaping, the dragon let out fire and burned the side of his face.

"Cedric," Catherine screamed. He seemed unphase and just happy to be alive. The judges gave him extremely high scores, which was the only comfort Catherine could find in it.

"He's going to be alright," soothed Pansy. Around this time, Arabella appeared to find comfort in the girls and Theo as Fleur made her way out there. Gabrielle, Fleur's younger sister, grasped onto the brunette who had no intention of letting her go. Arabella clutched onto Theo, and Pansy and Catherine squeezed Gabrielle's free hand. Gabrielle was quite pleased by the attention of the two older girls.

Fleur's opponent was the Common Welsh Green. She used a sort of sleeping charm to knock out the dragon and retrieve the egg. She was fine until the dragon let out a snore and caught her skirt on fire. She quickly used Augumenti to extinguish the fire. However, it did cause her score to suffer a bit and not beat Cedric's.

Krum's performance was of little merit, and Catherine didn't watch it much. Pansy and she were consoling Gabrielle during it. Gabrielle had cried in fear of Fleur's almost injury. Catherine sympathized with having to watch someone you care about so deeply being in these tasks. Otherwise, she wouldn't have even spared her a second glance.

Krum also did score higher than Cedric, much to Catherine's disdain. However, that disdain disappeared when she heard Harry Potter's name be called. He was to face a Hungarian Horntail.

Harry made his way into the arena with a shaky walk, when he didn't see the dragon, he went for the egg. Catherine gasped in shock as the dragon almost burnt him to a crisp almost immediately. Then, she laughed along with her friends to keep up appearances. However, Catherine heard Theo muttering angrily about bleeding dragons and Potter under his breath.

Harry then started to weave away from the dragon before summoning his Firebolt. Catherine was actually quite pleased when she saw him grasping the golden egg moments later. And once again, his scores were better than Cedric, even though he had beat his time.