Lalia opened her eyes to find herself underwater in the Black Lake once again. This time when she attempted to move she was able to. When she turned around after swimming away to see what was holding her down last time, she saw herself floating there. Her eyes were closed and her skin extremely pale.
The girl recoiled in shock before noticing the cord attached to her leg and the lake floor. She attempted to swim towards the rope attached to her leg, but her kicking legs failed her.
There was a tug on her ankle and Lalia looked down to see her own ankle bound to the lake floor.
Lalia tugged on the rope, but it remained firmly in place.
The rope tightened. No longer slack and being beaten by the rocking in the water, Lalia stopped resisting at looked at the rope taut in the water. Suddenly, her ankle was pulled down forcefully.
Her screams were silent bubbles in the water. Lalia felt her legs sinking into the Black Lake floor. She fought against the pull on her legs as she continued to sink. Lalia began crying as her torso was submerged in the ground and before long, her head reached the sandy bottom.
Voices echoed around Lalia's ears.
"Come seek us where our voices sound,
We cannot sing above the ground,
And while you're searching, ponder this:
We've taken what you'll sorely miss,
An hour long you'll have to look,
And to recover what we took,
But past an hour - the prospect's black,
Too late, it's gone, it won't come back."
She closed her mouth and silently cried as she could do nothing but see the floor approaching her line of sight. Glancing around desperately, Lalia realized there was nothing she could do as tears fell out of her eyes.
Lalia closed her eyes tightly as her head became fully submerged. She silently pleaded in her head.
Taking a deep breath, Lalia opened her eyes and saw the ceiling of her dormitory above her. The girl choked out a sob as she realized it had just been a dream. Lalia sat up in her bed and saw the figure of a woman with light brunette hair in the doorway. She squinted her eyes at the faded figure.
"Mom?" she asked quietly.
Lalia rubbed at her eyes to see an empty doorway. Her throat clenched and eyes watered as she laid back down. She curled into the fetal position and attempted to quietly sob, waiting for the sun to rise.
Lalia felt like time had been standing still. The darkness was still covering the sky outside when her arm began to burn. She hissed in pain, turning to look at it, seeing it redden suddenly in front of her. The pain continued to burn at her skin until it immediately stopped. Her gaze returned to her upper arm where a red hand print remained.
The night passed more quickly from that point on. Lalia found herself sitting next to the trio that had waved her over to Gryffindor table.
Harry had begun urgently telling them about his previous night when he had deciphered the golden egg. He began to recant the song for them:
""Come seek us where our voices sound,
We cannot sing above the ground,
And while you're searching, ponder this:"
Before Harry could continue, Lalia finished for him.
"We've taken what you'll sorely miss,
An hour long you'll have to look,
And to recover what we took,
But past an hour - the prospect's black,
Too late, it's gone, it won't come back."
"How did you...," Harry began to ask.
"You said you'd already worked out that egg clue!" said Hermione indignantly.
"Keep your voice down!" said Harry crossly. "I just need to- sort of fine-tune it, all right?"
Lalia rubbed at her arm which occasionally ached from the fabric of her robe scratching the burn mark.
"Just forget the egg for a minute, all right?" Harry hissed. "I'm trying to tell you about Snape and Moody. . . ."
Harry began telling the group as quickly as possible about the conversation he had overheard in the halls the night before.
"Snape said Moody's searched his office as well?" Ron whispered, his eys alight with interest. "What. . . . d'you reckon Moody's here to keep an eye on Snape as well as Karkaroff?"
"Well, I dunno if that's what Dumbledore asked him to do, but he's definitely doing it," said Harry. "Moody said Dumbledore only lets Snape stay here because he's giving him a second chance or something. . . ."
"What?" said Ron, his eyes widening. "Harry ... maybe Moody thinks Snape put your name in the Goblet of Fire!"
Lalia could not resist the wince her body did at the mention of the Goblet that had appeared in her dreams.
"Oh Ron," said Hermione, shaking her head skeptically, "we thought Snape was trying to kill Harry before, and it turned out he was saving Harry's life, remember?"
Th group considered the validity of Hermione's words before the girl continued. Lalia found herself remembering the insult she had hurled at the professor.
"I don't care what Moody says," Hermione went on. "Dumbledore's not stupid. He was right to trust Hagrid and Professor Lupin, even though loads of people wouldn't have given them jobs, so why shouldn't he be right about Snape, even if Snape is a bit -"
"- evil," said Ron promptly. "Come on, Hermione, why are all these dark wizard catchers searching his office, then?"
"Why had Mr. Crouch been pretending to be ill?" said Hermione, ignoring Ron. "It's a bit funny, isn't it, that he can't manage to come to the Yule Ball, but he can get up here in the middle of the night when he wants to?"
"You just don't like Crouch because of that elf, Winky," said Ron.
"You just want to think Snape's up to something," said Hermione.
"I just want to now what Snape did with his first chance, if he's on his second one," said Harry grimly.
"I just want you to shut up so I can eat," Lalia grumbled, rubbing at her sore arm.
As the second task approached, Lalia spent more time with Ginny. Her avoidance of the group was noticed, but Lalia couldn't overcome her fear of sinking into the Black Lake like in her dream.
"Lia?" Harry asked, standing behind her seated figure at the Ravenclaw table two days before the second task.
The girl jumped and turned around to face the boy. He leaned down to whisper to her.
"Sirius asked for the date of the next Hogsmeade weekend. I'll let you know when he responds."
Once Lalia nodded at him, Harry made his way to his two friends seated at the Gryffindor table.
The girl was embarrassed at her avoidance of the trio, especially since she knew Harry needed her help with the second task. Her fears of sinking into the lake outweighed her need to help the boy. She didn't know where she would begin to help him, not when she couldn't share her dream with him.
"Are you okay? You've been avoiding them," Ginny asked her softly.
"What? Oh, yeah. Yeah, I'm okay," stumbled Lalia.
"Well, if you say so. You know I'd be okay if you wanted to spend some more time with them."
"I know. But I'm fine with where I am." She smiled at Ginny and rested her head on her shoulder.
By the evening of the second task, Hermione, with secret urging from Ginny, had convinced Lalia to help her and the boys in the library as Harry still hadn't figured out how he would breathe underwater. The four of them sat in the library as the sun set outside, tearing feverishly through page after page of spells, hidden from one another by the massive piles of books on the desk in front of each of the,.
"I don't reckon it can be done," said Ron's voice flatly from the other side of the table. "There's nothing. Nothing. Closest was that thing to dry up puddles and ponds, that Drought Charm, but that was nowhere near powerful enough to drain the lake."
"There must be something," Hermione muttered, moving a candle closer to her. Her eyes were tired she was pouring over the tiny print of Olde and Forgotten Bewitchments and Charmes with her nose about an inch from the page. "They'd never have set a task that was undoable."
Lalia scoffed darkly thinking of her dream. She let her book fall shut before grabbing another.
"They have," said Ron. "Harry, just go down to the lake tomorrow, right, stick your head in, yell at the merpeople to give back whatever they've nicked, and see if they chuck it out. Best you can do, mate."
"There's a way of doing it!" Hermione said crossly. "There just has to be!"
"I know what I should have done," said Harry, resting, face down, on Saucy Tricks for Tricky Sorts. "I should've learned to be an Animagus like Sirius."
Lalia sat up straight, realizing just then that her nightmare had led her to displace the second mandrake leaf she had kept in her mouth.
"Yeah, you could've turned into a goldfish any time you wanted!" said Ron.
"Or a frog," yawned Harry. He was exhausted.
"It takes years to become an Animagus, and then you have to register and everything," said Hermione vaguely, now squinting own the index of Weird Wizarding Dilemmas and Their Solutions. "Professor McGonagall told us, remember ... you've got to register with the Improper Use of Magic Office... what animal you become, and your markings, so you can't abuse it... ."
"Hermione, I was joking," said Harry wearily. "I know I haven't got a chance of turning into a frog by tomorrow morning.
"But man would it be helpful," Lalia muttered, sliding into her chair, thinking of her own secret mission to become an Animagus.
"Oh this is no use," Hermione said, snapping shut Weird Wizarding Dilemmas. "Who on earth wants to make their nose hairs ringlets?"
"I wouldn't mind," said Fred Weasley's voice. "Be a talking point, wouldn't it?"
Lalia, Harry, Ron, and Hermione looked up. Fred and George had just emerged from behind some bookshelves.
"What're you two doing here?" Ron asked.
"Looking for the you," said George. "McGonagall wants Lalia and Hermione."
"Why?" said Hermione, looking surprised. The two girls glanced at each other with raised eyebrows.
"Dunno ... she was looking a bit grim, though," said Fred.
"We're supposed to take you down to her office," said George.
"We'll meet you both back in the common room," Hermione told the boys as she got up to go with Lalia - both of the girls looked very anxious. "Bring as many of these books as you can, okay?
"Right," said Harry uneasily.
Lalia and Hermione silently followed Fred and George to McGonagall's office, where the boys jokingly bowed before leaving the girls at the opened door.
Lalia peeked in to see more people than she expected. With Professor McGonagall, there was Professor Dumbledore, Professor Karkaroff, Madame Maxime, Professor Snape, and Ludo Bagman. Sitting in chairs in the room was Cho Chang and a young blond Beauxbatons student that Lalia had never seen before.
"Ah, you're here. Come in," McGonagall said, sounding nervous.
"Professor? Did we do something?" Hermione asked, softly. Similarly to Lalia, she had become uncomfortable at the amount of authority figures waiting for them.
"No, no. We have something to ask you both. Please sit."
Lalia and Hermione slowly placed themselves into the chairs next to the other two students in the room.
"Great, now that you all are here let me explain," Ludo Bagman exclaimed loudly, seeming to be in a much cheerier mood than the students and McGonagall. "We need you for the second task of the tournament!"
Despite Bagman's excitement, none of the girls understood what he meant and the three Hogwarts students looked to Professor McGonagall for an explanation.
"The champions are suppose to retrieve something important to them. You four have been chosen as the important someone to them. Miss Gabrielle for Miss Delacour, Miss Granger for Mr. Krum, Miss Chang for Mr. Diggory, and Miss Black for Mr Potter."
Lalia's face whitened as she realized that this meant she was going to be placed into the lake.
"We would give you a potion that would put you to sleep until you had been retrieved. It is completely,"
"No," Lalia said standing up. Her breathing had become very panicked as she tried to find her way out of the situation. "Can't you do someone or something else?" she pleaded.
"Well, yes, Mr. Potter's second option was Mr. Weasley. But Miss Black, I assure you that it is completely safe. You will feel as if you have woken up from sleep. Are you sure that you do not want to participate? We will not force you," McGonagall said.
"Is there any reason you are worried?" Professor Dumbledore asked the girl, staring deeply at her.
Lalia opened her mouth to protest being put in the Lake, but realized she shouldn't know about the Lake yet as it hadn't been mentioned. She thought of a way to express her dream, but looking around the room she knew it was not a possibility.
"No," Lalia felt back into her chair with a stone cold face. She ignored the worried glance Hermione was sending her.
"So you will give your consent?" asked Professor Dumbledore.
The girl nodded back at him before turning her attention to Professor Snape ladling a liquid into four cups.
"You will drink this potion that Professor Snape has prepared for you and drift into a sleep. We will place you in the Black Lake for the tournament and you will wake up once your champion has brought you above water. If they fail to retrieve you, we will retrieve you after the tournament," McGonagall explained. "Are there any questions?"
When no one uttered a word, she nodded.
Cups were being handed to the students by the professors.
Lalia and the girls are glanced at one another. The uncertainty was clear on all their faces. Lalia and Hermione nodded at each other and both began to drink the potion. This urged the other girls to begin doing so also.
The empty cup was handed back to the waiting hand of McGonagall. Lalia waited to see if she would feel any different as the Professors began discussing the task with each other. Lalia blinked her eyes, feeling her eyebrows squint as she closed them tightly. She glanced to the girls next to her.
Gabrielle had already closed her eyes, her eyelids fluttering as if she was fighting sleep, but was losing. Cho had rested her head in her hand looking as if she was about to doze away in History of Magic class. Hermione was blinking excessively and when Lalia attempted to comment on it, she felt her eyes begin to blink a few times and then realized how heavy her head felt. Tired of fighting to open her eyes, she figured she would just close them for a moment to prepare to open them again. She relaxed her breathing and eyelids and waited to open them and check on Hermione.