Born From Madness (Harry Potter Fanfic)

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Hermione shrieked as she felt herself being pulled down by an unseen force. She struggled between looking down and trying to swim away. She finally spotted what was attacking her. It was a crowd of grindylows that were trying to pull her down. She tried to kick them off her but they kept multiplying and pulling her down even further. 

"Stop! Release me!" Hermione growled at them, hoping they would listen to her, as she kept trying to fling a few off her legs. A few let go but a few still kept their grip on her. Hermione was trying to remember what to do to get rid of a grindylow when a thought popped within her head. Pulling out her wand, Hermione waved it around as she mumbled, 

"Accio fish!" 

Suddenly a bunch of fish came twirling towards them in little flips. The sight of the fish grabbed the grindylows' attention as they quickly removed their hands from her ankles and proceeded to go get to the fish. She was paddling away when another thought came into her head. She peered around till she found one of the smaller grindylows. 

"Excuse me?" she called out, hoping maybe this time it would listen. It turned its head to see it chewing on one of the fish she had brought to them. 

"Would you mind, showing me to the merpeople's home? I need to get something they stole from me." Hermione explained to it. The grindylow looked almost scared before nodding its head in agreement. 

They swam across the lake a few yards till they found exactly what Hermione was looking for. As they were getting closer, the grindylow made a whimpering sound before turning around and rushing back to its home. She didn't want to ask what's in there to freak a grindylow out, but she pressed on. She swam as fast as she could as she could as suddenly she felt something touch her leg again. She peered around to see it was Harry, who was grinning at her and waving a webbed hand. As they were swimming together, Hermione could see exactly what they took. There were five people there, two of which were Ron and Fred. Hermione and Harry hurried along as they reached Ron and Fred. Hermione busied herself with releasing Fred while Harry worked on Ron. 

It wasn't long till she saw Cedric swimming towards them and proceeded to help Cho and then not shortly afterwards Viktor came and save another student, Hermione didn't recognized. Hermione started to swim away when she noticed Fleur hadn't appeared yet. She glanced over to Harry then at the little girl, who was floating with a seaweed wrapped around her ankle. 

"I think something happened to Fleur! We can't just leave this little girl here! It's not worth winning if someone is left behind to die!" Hermione cried out to Harry as she began to fumble with getting to the girl while holding onto Fred. Harry rounded back with her as they fumbled to grab hold of the little girl. Once they had gotten the girl out, they were able to swim back down the lake as fast as they could. Then, just as they were swimming over the seaweed patch, Hermione found more grindylows than before came swarming them. 

"Harry! Take them! I'll stay behind to distract them." Hermione demanded him. Harry looked at her with concern, but started to swim off a bit. She turned around and began shooting spells around her. Just as she was shooting her hexes, one of the grindylows had grabbed hold of her arm and was making it hard for Hermione to shoot spells. She felt she was about to lose her wand when a flash of red past her face and hit the grindylow. Hermione turned to see Harry rushing back to the side. 

"What are you doing? Where are the other three?" Hermione asked as she was fighting alongside Harry. 

"I let the float to the surface! I couldn't leave you behind!" Harry told her as they were shooting spells here and there then trying to get to the surface. Hermione could feel herself getting tired and knew they couldn't keep this up. She turned as she grabbed hold of Harry's arm and held her wand upward. 

"Ascendio!" She called out. Suddenly they shot up through the surface of the water then dropped against the docks. Upon landing, Hermione didn't expect herself accidentally hitting her head against one of the metal bars as it knocked her out. 

"Hermione! Hermione wake up!" Harry called out as he leaned over her as began trying to shake her up. Viktor and Fred moved over as they where trying to wake her up. 

"Stand back!" they darted as Madam Pomfrey rushed over to Hermione's side and did something Harry couldn't see, but it seemed to do the trick as Hermione came jolting up, spitting water. 

"Hermione! We did it! We-- well we were last, but we made it back okay!" Harry called out as he rushed to her side. 

"GABRIELLE! Gabrielle!" Hermione and Harry shot their heads up to see Fleur rushing over to the little girl they had pulled out of the water. They were hugging each other as Fleur was crying out about the Grindylows getting her. Then she suddenly turned towards Hermione and Harry. 

"You saved my sister! You didn't-- you didn't have too-- but you did! Oh thank you! Thank you both!" Fleur told them, tears dripping down her face, as she gave a kiss on both Harry's and Hermione's foreheads before going back to hugging Gabrielle. Just then Harry noticed Dumbledore motioning for his fellow judges to come over with him before then breaking. 

"Ladies and gentlemen, we have reached our decision. We will award marks out of fifty for each of the champions..." Bagman told them. They gave Fleur twenty-five due to her not getting her sister out of the lake. Then Cedric got forty-seven points due to just being a minute outside the time limit of an hour. Krum was awarded forty points due to being second in coming back. Then it was Harry's and Hermione's turn. 

"Harry used a gillyweed to great effect while Hermione used the bubble-head charm,  but even though they returned last and outside the time limit of an hour, we have been informed that Mr. Potter was second to reach the hostages as Miss Granger was the first to arrive but delay in their returns is due to his and Miss Granger's determination to ensure the safety of everyone's there." Bagman stated to them, "And due to this, we felt it was only fair to give both Miss Granger and Mr. Potter both forty-five points." 

Hermione and Harry jumped in excited as they were in first place with Cedric. Both Cedric, Fleur, and Fred were clapping wildly at them. She saw Viktor was lightly clapping, but she felt it was because of her and not Harry. Then Madam Pomfrey began motioning them to the castle to get dried off.