"Oh, Good Morrigan," I said, relieved. "I thought something from the depths of the woods had come for me."
"No, just me," Harry said.
"What're you doing out here?"
"Hagrid wanted to show me something about the first task."
"Really? What?"
"Dragons."
"Dragons?"
"That's the first task. We have to get past them. Who was that?"
My heart skipped a beat in alarm, but I tried to keep my expression neutral. "Who was... who?"
"I thought I heard you talking to someone. I could hear two people speaking. And then I thought I saw someone behind you."
Crap. Crap. Crap.
Okay, gotta cover up.
"Okay, yeah," I said. "You can't tell anyone." I waved him over like I was about to divulge a secret.
Harry came over and shrouded us both in his cloak. "Who was it?"
"Luke."
Harry's eyebrows disappeared into his bangs. "Luke? I thought he was in America."
"He is. I was just talking to a vision of him. There's this thing we learned at camp that lets us communicate with each other."
"Sort of like a telephone?"
"Yeah, but you can see them, too."
"Nice! Maybe we could do that with Sirius!" Harry grinned. Then he frowned. "But why were you trying to hide it?"
"Um..." What was a good reason for me not to use it in front of people? "It's kind of... illegal?"
"Really? Why?"
"Ah... well... because... the Ministry can't track them. And of course the Ministry has to keep an eye on everything. So yeah."
Harry frowned. "Are you lying?"
"No," I lied.
"You have this sort of high-pitched voice when you lie."
"What are you talking about?" I asked, trying to deepen my voice for good measure. I looked down at my watch. What time was it? "Oh, crap, Harry, we gotta get back to Gryffindor Tower for Sirius! Come on!"
"But — okay, fine, but we're not done with this conversation!"
On the way, Harry told me what he'd seen before finding me — the dragons, the disgusting way Hagrid and Madame Maxime flirted with each other, stumbling into Karkaroff, who was probably heading into the Forbidden Forest.
"I bet he sneaked off his ship to try and find out what the first task was going to be," I said. "He might even have spotted Hagrid and Madame Maxime heading off around the forest together."
"Yeah, and now all Karkaroff has to do is follow the sound of voices, and he'll know about the dragons."
"I feel really bad about Hagrid, though," I said. "He doesn't know Madame Maxime is playing him and using him to get an advantage."
"And by the looks of it," Harry added, "the only champion who doesn't know what's happening on Tuesday is Cedric."
"Are you going to tell him?"
"I dunno."
We reached the castle, slipped in through the front doors, and began to climb the marble stairs; Harry was very out of breath, but he didn't slow down, so I kept up. We had less than five minutes to get up to the fire, after all.
"Balderdash!" I told the Fat Lady, who was snoozing in her frame in front of the portrait hole.
"If you say so," she muttered sleepily, without opening her eyes, and the picture swung forward to admit us. We climbed inside.
"How are you not out of breath?" Harry wondered.
"I run around a lot?" I shrugged. "I dunno, why are you out of breath?"
"Because I don't run around a lot?"
"Well, now you know what to do. Run around a lot."
"Pfft."
The common room was deserted, and, judging by the fact that it smelled quite normal, Hermione hadn't needed to set off any Dungbombs to ensure that Harry, Sirius, and I got privacy.
Harry pulled off the Invisibility Cloak and threw himself into an armchair in front of the fire. I perched on the armrest of the chair. The room was in semidarkness; the flames were the only source of light. Nearby, on a table, the Support Cedric Diggory! badges the Creeveys had been trying to improve were glinting in the firelight. They now read POTTER REALLY STINKS. I snorted.
"Look," I said, picking one up and showing it to Harry.
"I think the Creevey brothers were trying to improve them. Clearly didn't work."
"Unless you're Malfoy."
"Yeah." Harry looked back into the flames, and jumped. I looked, too.
Sirius's head was sitting in the fire.
"Good Morrigan," I wheezed.
Harry scrambled out of his chair, crouched down by the hearth, and said, "Sirius!"
I kneeled beside Harry and got a good look at Sirius.
Sirius looked different from my memory of him. When we'd last seen him, Sirius's face had been gaunt and sunken, surrounded by a quantity of long, black, matted hair — but the hair was short and clean now, Sirius's face was fuller, and he looked younger and healthier.
"Aisling," Sirius said when he saw me, his face breaking out in a fatherly grin.
"Hi, Siri — er, Dad." I'd almost forgotten that I was supposed to call him that. "How are you doing?"
"Never mind me, how are you?"
"Okay, I guess."
"Harry?"
"I'm fi—"
I elbowed him. He didn't need to say he was fine. Now was not the time. "Tell him."
So Harry did. Before I knew it, he was talking more than he'd talked in days — about how no one believed he hadn't entered the tournament of his own free will, how Rita Skeeter had lied about him in the Daily Prophet, how he couldn't walk down a corridor without being sneered at — and about Ron, Ron not believing him, Ron's jealousy...
". . . and now Hagrid's just shown me what's coming in the first task, and it's dragons, Sirius, and I'm a goner," he finished desperately.
Sirius looked at him, eyes full of concern, eyes that had not yet lost the look that Azkaban had given them - that deadened, haunted look He had let Harry talk himself into silence without interruption, but now he said, "Dragons we can deal with, Harry, but we'll get to that in a minute — I haven't got long here. . . I've broken into a wizarding house to use the fire, but they could be back at any time. There are things I need to warn you about."
"What?" said Harry.
"Karkaroff," said Sirius. "Harry, he was a Death Eater. You know what Death Eaters are, don't you?"
"Yes — he — what?"
"He was caught, he was in Azkaban with me, but he got released. I'd bet everything that's why Dumbledore wanted an Auror at Hogwarts this year - to keep an eye on him. Moody caught Karkaroff. Put him into Azkaban in the first place."
"Karkaroff got released?" I asked. "Why did they release him?"
"He made a deal with the Ministry of Magic," said Sirius bitterly. "He said he'd seen the error of his ways, and then he named names... he put a load of other people into Azkaban in his place... He's not very popular in there, I can tell you. And since he got out, from what I can tell, he's been teaching the Dark Arts to every student who passes through that school of his. So watch out for the Durmstrang champion as well."
"I bet Hermione would agree with you," I mused, thinking about how annoyed Hermione was every time she saw Krum and his flock of fangirls in the library.
"Okay," said Harry slowly. "But... are you saying Karkaroff put my name in the goblet? Because if he did, he's a really good actor. He seemed furious about it. He wanted to stop me from competing."
"We know he's a good actor," said Sirius, "because he convinced the Ministry of Magic to set him free, didn't he? Now, I've been keeping an eye on the Daily Prophet, Harry—"
" — you and the rest of the world," said Harry bitterly.
" — and reading between the lines of that Skeeter woman's article last month, Moody was attacked the night before he started at Hogwarts. Yes, I know she says it was another false alarm," Sirius said hastily, seeing Harry about to speak, "but I don't think so, somehow. I think someone tried to stop him from getting to Hogwarts. I think someone knew their job would be a lot more difficult with him around. And no one's going to look into it too closely; Mad-Eye's heard intruders a bit too often. But that doesn't mean he can't still spot the real thing. Moody was the best Auror the Ministry ever had."
"So... what are you saying?" said Harry slowly. "Karkaroff's trying to kill me? But — why?"
"I feel like this has something to do with what happened at the Quidditch World Cup," I said. "It's been years. Why would they suddenly show up at a sporting event right before the Triwizard Tournament?"
Sirius nodded. "I agree, Aisling. There was the World Cup — and then — did you hear about that Ministry of Magic witch who's gone missing?"
"Bertha Jorkins?" Harry and I chorused.
"Exactly... she disappeared in Albania, and that's definitely where Voldemort was rumored to be last... and she would have known the Triwizard Tournament was coming up, wouldn't she?"
"Yeah, but... it's not very likely she'd have walked straight into Voldemort, is it?" said Harry.
"Listen, I knew Bertha Jorkins," said Sirius grimly. "She was at Hogwarts when I was, a few years above your dad and me. And she was an idiot. Very nosy, but no brains, none at all. It's not a good combination, Harry. I'd say she'd be very easy to lure into a trap."
"So... so Voldemort could have found out about the tournament?" said Harry. "Is that what you mean? You think Karkaroff might be here on his orders?
"I don't know," said Sirius slowly, "I just don't know...Karkaroff doesn't strike me as the type who'd go back to Voldemort unless he knew Voldemort was powerful enough to protect him. But whoever put your name in that goblet did it for a reason, and I can't help thinking the tournament would be a very good way to attack you and make it look like an accident."
"Okay, but what I want to know is what in Morrigan's name is up with European Wizarding Schools. They're letting a known ex-Death Eater run a school. And the teachers here at Hogwarts — Quirrel tried to kill Harry, Lockhart was extremely incompetent and he also tried to attack Harry. And Lupin — well, he was a great guy, but we got really lucky last year. We could've been killed. And now Moody, teaching us all of those Unforgivable Curses... I mean, in America I think you have to jump through a lot of hoops to become a teacher."
Harry and Sirius stared at me.
"Sorry, I went down a rabbit hole there. Please continue... Triwizard Tournament, looking like a good way to kill Harry and make it look like an accident..."
"Looks like a really good plan from where I'm standing," said Harry, grinning bleaky. "They'll just have to stand back and let the dragons do their stuff."
"Right — these dragons," said Sirius, speaking very quickly now. "There's a way, Harry. Don't be tempted to try a Stunning Spell — dragons are strong and too powerfully magical to be knocked out by a single Stunner, you need about half a dozen wizards at a time to overcome a dragon -"
"Yeah, I know, I just saw," said Harry.
"But you can do it alone," said Sirius. "There is away, and a simple spell's all you need. Just —"
"Wait, do you hear that?" I held up a hand to silence him, my heart suddenly pounding as though it would burst. I could hear footsteps coming down the spiral staircase behind him. Going off of Harry's expression, he could hear it, too.
"Go!" he hissed at Sirius. " Go! There's someone coming!"
Harry scrambled to his feet, hiding the fire — I heard a tiny pop! in the fire behind him and knew Sirius had gone. Harry and I watched the bottom of the spiral staircase. Who had decided to go for a stroll at one o'clock in the morning, and stopped Sirius from telling Harry how to get past a
dragon?
It was Ron. Dressed in his maroon paisley pajamas, Ron stopped dead facing Harry across the room, and looked around.
"What're you two doing?" he said.
"What's that got to do with you?" Harry snarled. "What are you doing down here at this time of night?"
"Harry, chill," I said.
"I just wondered where you —" I shot him a look, warning him not to let the conversation escalate, and Ron broke off, shrugging. "Nothing. I'm going back to bed."
"Just thought you'd come nosing around, did you?" Harry shouted.
"Harry!" I snapped. Ron had no idea what he'd walked in on, he hadn't done it on purpose. There was no need to be getting this aggressive.
"Sorry about that," said Ron, his face reddening with anger. "Should've realized you didn't want to be disturbed. I'll let the two of you get on with your snogging session."
"Our WHAT?" I shrieked, standing straight up, my fists clenched.
Harry seized one of the POTTER REALLY STINKS badges off the table and chucked it, as hard as he could, across the room. It hit Ron on the forehead and bounced off. If it hadn't been such an aggressive move, I would've commended him for his aim.
"There you go," Harry said. "Something for you to wear on Tuesday. You might even have a scar now, if you're lucky... That's what you want, isn't it?"
"Harry!" I hissed, but he wasn't listening to me. He'd gone into Dramatic Angry Idiot Mode. He strode across the room toward the stairs. I half expected Ron to stop him, but Ron just stood there as Harry stormed past him to the boys' dorms.
We stood there for a few moments.
"We weren't kissing," I stated.
"I know. Sorry."
"It's fine... he's stressed out. He's just found out that for the first task they're going to have to get past dragons."
"What?"
"Also, you kind of interrupted his conversation with Sirius in the fire," I added. "And Sirius was trying to tell him how to deal with the dragons. So... yeah." I yawned. "Anyway, I'm gonna go to bed. Good night. And please, Ron, for the love of all things holy, just stop this whole jealousy thing with Harry. It's driving all of us insane."
I headed up to the girls' dorm and slipped into bed.
Enjoy and comment for more!
~~~~ Kingfisher ~~~~