FINITE | Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire [4]

𝘅𝘅𝘅𝗶𝗶 | 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘀𝘂𝗺𝗺𝗼𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗰𝗵𝗮𝗿𝗺

Gwen got up on Sunday morning and accompanied Hermione and Ginny to breakfast. It took everything within her not to blurt out what the first task was, or what Sirius had said the night before, because Ginny was there and she couldn't disclose anything while Ginny was there.

  Hermione was sending Gwen looks every now and then, as if to say, You'll tell me if I don't hear it from Harry first, won't you?. Hermione had been asleep by the time Gwen had gone to bed the night before, but she seemed to have guessed that Gwen had been present for Sirius' meeting with Harry.

  The girls were just finishing up their plates of scrambled eggs when Harry joined them, almost dragging Gwen and Hermione from the Great Hall and down to the lake where he filled Hermione in on the events of the early morning hours.

  'Let's just keep you alive until Tuesday evening,' Hermione said when he had finished. 'We'll worry about Karkaroff later.'

  So, as they had done so countless times over the last few weeks, the three of them went up to the library to do some research.

  'Talon clipping by charms... treating a scale rot... This is all for nutters like Hagrid who want to keep them healthy...'

  They had pulled down every book they could find on dragons, and all three of them were working through the pile. Almost every book so far had been useless, focusing more on dragon maintenance and dragonology than how to fight one.

  '"Dragons are very difficult to slay, owing to the ancient magic that imbues their thick hides, which none but the most powerful spells can penetrate...",' Gwen read, closing Dragonology For Beginners. 'But Sirius said that a simple one would do it...'

  'Let's try some spellbooks, then,' said Harry, throwing aside Men Who Love Dragons Too Much.

  They began working through a pile of spellbooks, Harry and Gwen silently scanning the pages while Hermione whispered continuously between them.

  'Well, there are Switching Spells... but what's the point of Switching it? Unless you swapped its teeth for wine gums or something that would make it less dangerous... The trouble is, like that book said, not much is going to get through a dragon's hide... I'd say Transfigure it, but something that big, you haven't really got a hope, I doubt even Professor McGonagall... unless you're supposed to put the spell on yourself? But they're not simple spells, I mean, we haven't done any of those in class, I only know about them because I've been doing OWL practice papers...'

  Gwen and Harry exchanged an exasperated look. All three of them were stressed, but neither Gwen nor Hermione could match Harry's anxiety. He was the one who would actually have to fight the dragon, and from what Harry had said about the four dragons he'd seen, they were all strong, horrifying creatures. Not that dragons weren't already horrifying... but to fight one... get passed one to a magical egg that would give him the next clue...