***
THE NEXT DAY GRACE and Harry told Hermione about Sirius's warning about Karkaroff and Dragons. Alarmed as she was by Sirius's warnings about Karkaroff, Hermione still thought that the dragons were the more pressing problem.
"Let's just try and keep you alive until Tuesday evening," she said desperately, "and then we can worry about Karkaroff."
So three of them had spent all the free time in the library trying to find about anything useful against a dragon. But so far they found nothing. At the end they had to leave the Library as Viktor Krum had again came and slouched on the seat far at the end of the table and behind him came his fan club who wouldn't let them concentrate. Grace was quite suspicious of what Krum did in the library. He was in the library awfully a lot.
The first class they had that day was Herbology, in which Harry didn't show up. He appeared after the class was over and told them about his talk with Moddy. He would use his Firebolt and for which he would need to learn a summoning spell.
And so they practiced. They didn't have lunch, but headed for a free classroom, where Harry tried with all his might to make various objects fly across the room toward him. He was still having problems. The books and quills kept losing heart halfway across the room and dropping like stones to the floor.
"Concentrate, Harry, concentrate. . . ."
"What d'you think I'm trying to do?" said Harry angrily. "A great big dragon keeps popping up in my head for some reason. . . . Okay, try again. . . ."
Hermione went for Arithmancy while Grace and Harry skipped Divination to practice. For an hour they kept on practicing the same spell over and over again. After having some dinner, they then returned to the empty classroom with Hermione, using the Invisibility Cloak to avoid the teachers. They kept practicing until past midnight. They would have stayed longer, but Peeves turned up and, pretending to think that Harry wanted things thrown at him, started chucking chairs across the room. Grace, Harry and Hermione left in a hurry before the noise attracted Filch, and went back to the Gryffindor common room, which was now mercifully empty.
At two o'clock in the morning, Harry stood near the fireplace, surrounded by heaps of objects: books, quills, several upturned chairs, an old set of Gobstones, and Neville's toad, Trevor. Only in the last hour had Harry really got the hang of the Summoning Charm.
"That's better, Harry, that's loads better," Grace said, looking exhausted but very pleased.
"Well, now we know what to do next time I can't manage a spell," Harry said, throwing a rune dictionary back to Grace, so he could try again, "threaten me with a dragon. Right . . ." He raised his wand once more. "Accio Dictionary!"
The heavy book soared out of Grace's hand, flew across the room, and Harry caught it.
"Harry, I really think you've got it!" said Grace delightedly.
"Just as long as it works tomorrow," Harry said. "The Firebolt's going to be much farther away than the stuff in here, it's going to be in the castle, and I'm going to be out there on the grounds. . . ."
"That doesn't matter," said Hermione firmly "Just as long as you're concentrating really, really hard on it, it'll come. Harry, we'd better get some sleep . . . you're going to need it."
The next day Grace was on her nerves. Both her an Hermione were. The atmosphere in the school was one of great tension and excitement and lessons were to stop midday.
Time was behaving in a more peculiar fashion than ever, rushing past in great dollops, so that one moment she seemed to be sitting down in her first lesson, History of Magic, and the next, walking into lunch . . . and then (where had the morning gone?)
It was time for the first task. Grace walked with Hermione to the where the task was going to be held. Everyone was walking there.
All three schools were there and they were holding banners for the person whom they were supporting. And in the arena was a dragon. Grace was starting to feel sick.
The first one to come was Cedric. Everything passed in blur. Cedric transfigured a rock into a dog to distract the dragon. But halfway through Dragon came back after Cedric, but he got the egg. Fleur tried to do a charm, to put the dragon into a trance. It kind of worked but then the dragon snored and great jet of flame shot out, and her skirt caught fire.
Who the hell where a skirt while fighting a dragon?
Krum hit the dragon with spell in the eye. Only thing is, it went trampling around in agony and squashed half the real eggs.
When Harry's chance came, Grace had her hands clasped together in worry.
The Dragon he was fighting was 'Hungarian Horntail' and it was deadliest out of the others. Harry then took out his wand and summoned his firebolt, just like she, Hermione and Harry had practiced. And then came his firebolt, hurtling toward him. He swung his leg and kicked off the ground.
Then she saw the Horntail soaring behind him. As the dragon let out fire, Harry dived.
"Great Scott, he can fly!" yelled Bagman as the crowd shrieked and gasped. "Are you watching this, Mr. Krum?"
Harry soared higher in a circle; the Horntail was still following his progress. Harry plummeted just as the Horntail opened its mouth but this time he was lucky — He missed the flames narrowly but the tail came whipping up to meet him instead, and as he swerved to the left, one of the long spikes grazed his shoulder, ripping his robes
She wished it wasn't a deep cut. He began to fly, first this way, then the other, not near enough to make the dragon breathe fire to stave him off, but still posing a sufficient threat to ensure the dragon kept her eyes on him. Its head swayed this way and that, watching him out of those vertical pupils, her fangs bared. . . . He flew higher. The Horntail's head rose with him, her neck now stretched to its fullest extent, still swaying, like a snake before its charmer. .
Harry rose high in the sky, the dragon shot a fire at him, which he dodged. And then she reared, spreading her great, black, leathery wings at last, as wide as those of a small airplane — and Harry dived. Before the dragon knew what he had done, or where he had disappeared to, he was speeding toward the ground as fast as he could go, toward the eggs now unprotected by her clawed front legs — he had taken his hands off his Firebolt — he had seized the golden egg —
And with a huge spurt of speed, he was off, he was soaring out over the stands.
"Yes!" Grace and Hermione yelled from the stands. "Brilliant, Harry!" Both seemed like they would be crying any minute from the relief.
"Look at that!" Bagman was yelling. "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!"
Grace, Hermione and Ron rushed toward Harry's tent. They had reached the tent and found Harry sitting inside, covered in sweat and dirt.
"Harry!" Grace exclaimed. "You were amazing! You were excellent!"
"Harry, you were brilliant!" Hermione said squeakily. "You were amazing! You really were!"
But Harry was looking at Ron, who was very white and staring at Harry as though he were a ghost.
"Harry," he said, very seriously, "whoever put your name in that goblet — I — I reckon they're trying to do you in!"
"Caught on, have you?" said Harry coldly. "Took you long enough."
Hermione and Grace stood nervously between them, looking from one to the other. Ron opened his mouth uncertainly.
"It's okay," 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!" Harry told her, bewildered.
"You two are so stupid !" she shouted, stamping her foot on the ground, tears splashing down her front. Then, before any of them could stop her, she had given all three of them a hug and dashed away, now positively howling.
"Barking mad," said Ron, shaking his head.
"Harry," said Grace. "c'mon, they'll be putting up your scores. . . ."
Harry and Grace ducked out of the tent, Ron by their side, talking fast.
"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 burned 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 skirt 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 as he, Grace and Harry reached the edge of the enclosure. Grace could see where the five judges were sitting — right at the other end, in raised seats draped in gold.
"It's marks out of ten from each one," Ron said, and Grace, squinting up the field, saw the first judge — Madame Maxime — raise her wand in the air. What looked like a long silver ribbon shot out of it, which twisted itself into a large figure eight.
"Not bad!" said Grace 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 was 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!" Ron 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!"
"You're tied in first place, Harry! You and Krum!" said Charlie, hurrying to meet them as they set off back toward 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 for a few more minutes. . . . Bagman wants a word, back in the champions' tent."
Ron and Grace said they would wait, so Harry went back in the tent. After a few minutes, Harry rejoined Ron and Grace, and they 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 they rounded the clump of trees, a witch leapt out from behind them.
It was Rita Skeeter. She was wearing acid-green robes today; the Quick-Quotes Quill in her hand 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. "Good-bye."
And he set off back to the castle with Grace and Ron.