The Boy Who Made the Right Choice

6- The first task

The following friday evening, the stars in the navy blue sky had just become visible above the loud cheering stadiums. Large glowing torches of fire clung to the railing of the crowd seats, illuminating the arena of an uneven rock crater in the center.

Draco stood in the champions' preparation tent, looking dashingly handsome in his Slytherin tournament attire. He paced in the tent, fiddling with his wand in his shaking hands, unaware of how long it had been when Dumbledore and Mr. Crouch entered the room, annoyingly followed along by Rita Skeeter. 

"Good evening, champions, now if you will gather round." Dumbledore gestured for the four of them to gather on either side of him, with Mr. Crouch standing across from him. 

"Now, Miss Delacour, if you will." Mr. Crouch held out a velvet pouch to the blonde girl, who reached her hand into it, and pulled out a small, green dragon. "The Common Welsh Green." 

Barty gradually had each champion pick out their dragon next; Vikctor Krum withdrew the Chinese Fireball, then Cedric Diggory with the Swedish Shortsnout. Draco's eyes widened as Mr. Crouch turn toward him, and he muttered under his breath.

"So that leaves the... "

"The Horntail." Draco finished, his voice barely above a whisper. He reached his hand into the pouch and pulled out the exact tiny representation of the Hungarian Horntail, the small dragon moved and sheared it's claws along Draco's protective glove.

He took a deep breath as a loud horn outside blew, anouncing for the first champion to step up. 

Harry stood in the crowd stands among Ron, Hermione, Ginny and the Weasley twins. Luna and Neville were sitting close by in higher seats, and they waved kindly over to the trio who smiled back over the roaring cheer as Cedric stepped out into the arena. 

Harry, having been had his wand confiscated by Hermione after he almost snapped it in half with his bare hands, had nothing in his firm, nervous grasp now and he naturally clasped his fists into a ball with deathly grip. 

"Hey mate, you alright?" Ron put a hand on the raven-haired boy's shoulder, and Harry waved it off as just being concerned for Cedric, though it was soon discovered as a little white lie, for every time a champion got through their dragon successfully, his nervousness seemed to grow even more.

At last, it was Draco's time to step out into the arena, his platinum hair shining silver under the slowly rising moon as the stars shone more visibly. His eyes caught the sight of the golden egg, almost glowing from the light of the fire torches around it. He mostly ignored the cheering from the crowd (the Slytherins being the loudest), and his grey eyes made their way up to a certain pattern in the stars up above. The constellation of a dragon.

Through the loud horn, someone started an intense countdown for when the dragon would be released into the arena. 

'12, 11, 10, 9... '

Draco took a deep breath, focusing his eyes down from the outline of a dragon he could see in the sky to a dark cave of which the Horntail should arise from.

'6, 5, 4... '

His grip on his wand tightened to as hard as Harry in the crowd was clutching his own hands. 

'3... 2... 1 - RELEASE!'

Out from the darkness of the cave, the winged beast itself had clambered on out, and immidiately glared daggers into Draco's eyes, but the boy didn't look away. 

"EXPULSO!" 

Immidiately, by the touch of Draco's spell the furious Horntail's eyes went to the shape of slits as it fell back against a stone wall of the crater, the rocks surrounding it exploding into a million pieces.