"Did you hear?" Heidi Macavoy asked Maxine O'Flaherty, both of Hufflepuff, from where they stood harvesting their blades of knotgrass at the table across from Clary and Vasantha in Herbology.
"They still haven't found him." Clary could hear Jeremy Stretton saying to Marcus Turner, also of Ravenclaw, a few tables over. "Disappeared without a trace after the Second Task."
No matter where Clary looked that day, all conversation surrounded a common topic, with few others in between: the disappearance of Barty Crouch from the Ministry of Magic. As one of the judges, he was supposed to turn up for the Second Task at the Black Lake, however he never showed up, claiming he was ill and sending Percy to judge in his absence, not that Percy had spoken to any of his siblings while he was there. While at first nobody thought anything of his absence, Harry had approached the rest of them later on, explaining that Sirius Black had found this to be quite suspicious, as Crouch was never one to take a day off from his duties, especially with something as important as the tournament.
As the weeks went on, however, and the judges continued to make announcements about the upcoming Third Task, his absence became more and more noticeable, and the letters from him had become much less frequent until they had stopped entirely. Rumors flooded the school about where he may have gone, and what sort of trouble the old wizard could have gotten into.
As for Cedric, who stood with Newt at the table next to theirs, harvesting their own knotgrass, all he could think about was the upcoming Third Task, whatever it may be, despite the knotgrass harvesting having been supposed to make for an easy, stress free morning. While the task was still a couple of months away, taking place at the beginning of June, the champions still had yet to learn what exactly they would be doing to determine the winner of the Triwizard Tournament, leading to stress arising from all of them, at least as far as Clary could tell. Though she didn't know Viktor and Fleur all that well, Fleur seemed worried whenever Clary would pass her in the corridors, instead of her usual bubbly yet snobby demeanor, and Viktor's usually calm and collected self didn't seem quite as calm or collected in recent days. While Harry and Cedric were tied for first place, it was still anyone's game, which heightened the stakes immeasurably.
When Professor Sprout finally let the students go for lunch, Clary watched as Cedric nearly rushed from the room, his mind still unable to think about anything not revolving around the Third Task. He'd come so far over the past few months, and after all this time, he was so close to victory. Clary was much more lax about leaving the greenhouse, slinging her messenger bag over her shoulder and following after Newt and Vasantha, who moved a little quicker in the pursuit of the lunch they'd been so impatiently awaiting since the beginning of the class.
The three of them found Cedric outside of the greenhouse, pacing back and forth as he waited for his friends. When he finally saw them exit the small building, he sighed in relief, crossing back over to them and taking Clary's hand with a small, strained smile.
"Hi," Cedric said. "Sorry about that. It was just so noisy in there, I needed to get out and clear my head for a moment."
"It's okay," Clary assured him, squeezing his hand softly as they began their trek back to the castle, to get to the Great Hall for lunch. "You've got time," she assured him. "I'm sure they'll make some announcement regarding what you have to do, but if not, just remember that all four of you are in the same boat, and they won't know anything either. And you're prepared, I know you are, no matter what the task ends up being."
"Do you know what you need?" Newt asked as they reached the castle, shooting his best friend a grin as he gestured into the Great Hall. "You need a nice, relaxing meal to take your mind off things. No talk about the tournament, or whatever happened to Crouch, but an afternoon with your best friends, free from stress."
"Well, you're right about that." Cedric agreed, letting out a deep breath as the four of them took seats at the Gryffindor table, instantly reaching forward to pile food onto their plates.
At the first call of an owl, Clary looked up, seeing a few owls begin to swoop in through the windows above, bringing mail to students milling about the Great Hall, enjoying their lunches. A few owls descended upon Clary and her friends, dropping small packages onto the middle of their plates, Newt managing to catch his just in time before it landed with a splash into his chicken soup. Clary picked hers up from where it had landed in her mashed potatoes, wiping the small package clean with a napkin before tearing it open to reveal the Easter egg sitting inside.
"Look at these," Vasantha mused with a smile, pulling her own out of the package and reading the tiny note written inside. "Clary, your mum's the best."
Clary smiled in return, looking from the egg back up to her friends, though the smile soon faded as she saw a figure moving behind where Cedric and Newt sat, making a beeline for the exit. She watched as Hermione ran out of the Great Hall, letters upon letters piled up in her arms, in addition to the package from Clary's mother. Although the young girl tried to hide it, Clary could see the tears that threatened to spill from Hermione's eyes, though she quickly reached the exit, rounding the corner and disappearing from sight.
"Hey, actually, I'm going to go see if Hermione's okay." Clary said, quickly stuffing the Easter egg into her bag and rising from the table. "I'll see you lot in the library later for homework?"
"Don't be too late," Cedric said with a small smile. "We've got that whole Charms essay to write, still."
Clary nodded, hurrying out of the Great Hall after Hermione and looking around for any sign of where she could have gone. To her luck, she spotted Hermione moving quickly up the staircase, and Clary rushed after her, knowing she was heading for Gryffindor Tower. Clary took the stairs two at a time, slowly closing the distance between herself and Hermione until she managed to just catch the Fat Lady's portrait before it shut, squeezing herself inside the common room, empty except for the two girls.
"Hermione!" Clary called out, resting her hands on her knees as she attempted to catch her breath.
"Clary?" Hermione asked, the Granger girl's eyebrows furrowing together in confusion as she turned back to the redead, and only then did Clary see just how much mail Hermione held in her arms.
"I wanted to make sure you were okay," Clary explained, stepping further into the common room before gesturing to the letters weighing the fourth year girl down. "Is that..?"
"Hate mail," Hermione spat venomously, shaking her head as she threw the pile down onto one of the couches, plopping down next to it with a small huff. "All of Rita Skeeter's readers think I played Harry before moving onto Viktor, and none of them seem to be too happy about it."
"Well, hey," Clary said, picking up a letter addressed to Hermione from a Margaret Dowson, tearing it up and throwing the pieces into the flickering flames of the fireplace. "Forget the nosy witches who can't mind their own business and get more invested in the romance between fourteen year olds than their own lives. Them writing to you just means they have nothing better to do, right? You have school, you have your friends, you even got Viktor Krum to ask you to the Yule Ball, for Merlin's sake!" Clary sighed exasperatedly. "Don't worry about them, Hermione."
Hermione smiled softly, picking a letter up off the couch and staring down at it for a moment before nodding.
"Well, go on," Clary urged her, jerking her head in the direction of the fireplace.
Hermione looked down at the letter again before ripping it up into pieces, throwing the strips of parchment into the flames with a satisfied grin. Almost instantly, she picked up another one, doing the same.
The two Gryffindor girls sat by the fire for a few minutes, laughing as they tore up the hate mail, the atmosphere in the room growing lighter and lighter as the kindling in the flames began to grow. Before they knew it, Hermione was tossing the final letter from Jane Greengrass into the flames, and the pile of hate mail was no more, the tear stains on Hermione's cheeks now those of happy tears.
"Are you okay?" Clary asked Hermione as their laughter finally subsided, the two girls sitting in silence and watching the flames.
Hermione nodded, finally turning back to Clary. "Yeah," she said. "I feel much better. Thank you."
"Of course," Clary assured her. "And if you ever get any more nasty letters like that, and want to make sure the common room fire keeps going, you know where to find me."