Book Three: The Heir and The Champions

XXXI - The Devil (Part Two)

Within the Stands

They were back in the stadium where the first task had taken place in, Ron, Hermione, Daphne, Tracey, Theodore, Blaise, and the rest of the Gryffindor Quidditch team had taken up almost an entire section to themselves as they looked down into what was once the arena. The arena had been repurposed for the task, it was now filled with crystals that had been ground to a fine powder and charmed to make it look like a perfect Topographic map of the warded area of the woods, it showed every hill, mound, pond, river, and open field. On the map were five glowing dots, one for each champion and one for the Hind they were hunting, Krum was green, Fleur was blue, Angelina was red, and Harry was a dark silver while the Hind was gold. With a wave of his wand, Ludo Bagman could zoom in on one section of the map, and the powdered crystal would resize and reshape to show the area he wanted, Bagman had shown off this feature while zooming in on every champion during the introduction and going down the list from first to last.

In Herminoe's opinion, it was a wonder of charm work and she couldn't help but compare it to the Marauder's map but in a three-dimensional plane and couldn't help but wonder if it could keep up with Harry's raw speed accurately.

The group hears Ludo Bagman give the countdown followed by the sound of the cannon going off, they watch as all but one color dot start moving, Angelina and Krum heading north towards the gold dot while the blue one starts to run west, directly toward the silver dot that was standing still.

"What is he doing?" Tracey asks, eyeing the silver dot while staying cozy under a thick blanket she and Theodore were wrapped up in, "He knows the crazy French bint is after him, so why isn't he running?" she asks.

"He is applying a few charms," Daphne says as she watches the map frowning.

"What kind?" Theodore asks, sounding curious.

"A few charms Hermione helped him learn, one to erase his scent, hide his tracks, walk on snow, stuff like that," Ron says dismissively.

"What about the disillusion charm?" one of the twins asks.

"We tried that, but it takes more than just raw power to cast it, it's one of the spells that you need a lot of experience to get it down perfectly," Hermione says, her eyes flickering between not mentioning that Harry had something a bit better than a charm if he want to become invisible, sadly, he wasn't allowed to use it in the tournament and Ron had pointed out that it was just bad tactics to announced he had it in the first place. Finally, after a few minutes, the silver dot takes off toward the east before curving slightly to the north, not slowing down for a moment.

"It seems Mister Potter will be the first Champion to encounter one of the dangers in the forest, the Turnabout Mist!" Bagman announces and waves his wand to let the map fall before the crystal climbs back up to show a zoomed-in patch of the woods, "Now let's see what Mist-" was as far as Ludo gets as the blur of raising sandy crystal blows right through that portion of the woods to Ron, Hermione, and Zoë's amusement. Harry was stubborn enough to throw off the Imperious Curse and the Hunt wasn't a domain that could be befuddled by a simple enchantment like that.

The powdered crystal falls once more and the larger map comes back showing the blue dot coming near Harry's starting camp, flickering on and off the map, everyone looking on hoping the Fleur wouldn't be able to pick up his tracks too fast, all Harry had to do was buy enough time for either the Moon to rise or for Angelina to catch the Hind, either one would do. But as the Blue dot gets to Harry's starting point and starts to head east.