Beginners: book 1, Goblet of Fire

The Golden Egg

Harry's treatment over the next weeks is comparable to mine at Ilvermorney. The Slytherins, in tangent with the Hufflepuffs, have created badges that read Support Cedric Diggory, the REAL Hogwarts Champion, and, when professors aren't looking, Potter Stinks. To make matter worse, Ron now refuses to speak to Harry, so Hermione and I have to juggle their communications. Taking turns to deliver messages between. The first task draws nearer with each minute. The Sunday before, Hagrid tells Harry it has to do with dragons and getting past them. I can't tell if this is better than when he didn't know what was coming, because no matter how much we search, we can't find any way to subdue a dragon. Hermione and I are sitting in the library reading ancient books of spells, hoping to find one that might work, when Harry comes marching up to us.

"Summoning charms." He says, out of breath.

"What?" Hermione says, looking up.

"I need to learn the summoning charm by tomorrow afternoon." He gasps, collapsing into a chair. "I need to summon my firebolt, then I can fly around the dragon."

"Well," I say, closing my book, "shit."

We had been learning the summoning charm, accio, but Harry was yet to master it, unable to make even a quill move. Hermione drilled him all through lunch, but to no avail. He practices all of divination and dinner, but can only make an inkpot move.

"Right, but your broom will be farther away, and it's much bigger. You need to focus, really hard," Hermione says the next day, in a classroom we took over before curfew. Books litter the floor around Harry, all of which he's summoned. The urgency of the countdown motivating. I sit there, mostly for moral support.

"What do you think I'm doing?" He snaps.

"Okay," I say, hopping off the desk I was using as a seat, "I think it's time for a break."

"No," Harry says, "I have less than 24 hours, we can't stop."

"Harry we're all exhausted, we can work more in the morning," I say, trying to reason with him. He steels his gaze and looks around the room.

"Accio desk," he says, pointing his wand at a desk. It squeaks along the floor a good foot, before giving up. This is by far the largest thing he's been able to move, and we all smile.

Just then Peeves floats through the door, "Ooo! Are we having a throwing fest?" He says, chucking things at us.

"Let's go," Hermione grabs our bags, and we sprint from the flying inkpots up to the common room. With a new fire burning in our hearts, we work well into the night. By 3 AM, the overstuffed chairs easily glide to Harry.

"I think you've got it," Hermione says, as we place the chairs back where they belong. "We should get some sleep."

She makes her way to the dorms, but Harry is making a really big deal of picking up a rune dictionary that we practiced with.

"You go, I'll be up soon," I say, she nods in understanding. Once I hear the door to the girl's dorm close, I turn to Harry, who much like in the past weeks, is staring into the fire. He pulls at his fingers, lost in his head.

"I'm really impressed," I say, walking closer to him. "48 hours ago you couldn't make a fly budge, now I dare say you're better than Hermione."

He makes a noise of agreement but keeps his eyes on the coals.

"C'mon, you're going to be fine. And even if you weren't, there's nothing you can do now. We've prepared as much as we can, we've got a plan, now get some sleep."

He looks up, still pulling at his fingers. "Yeah." In silence, he heads up the stairs and I follow. At the top, he pauses at the boy's dorm.

"I'll see you at breakfast," I say, determined to act like everything's normal.