Drarry & The Goblet of Fire: 4th year Re-write

Chapter 8 ~ The Quidditch World Cup

Harry arrives with the water, having only sloshed a bit onto his jeans, which he counts as a win. Outside the deceptively small tent, Mr. Weasly struggles with a pack of matches. At least twenty of the small sticks lie discarded and broken at his feet, still, he shows no signs of frustration, merely curiosity.

Taking pity, Harry heads over to him, setting his pail carefully down.

"Would you like me to show you, Mr Weasley?"

Ron's father nods enthusiastically, "Oh, yes. I'm no Molly, but I'd like to have something passable on the table before we head over to the arena."

Harry chuckles. Arthur Weasley talks about his wife as if he fell in love with her yesterday. Harry can't even remember Aunt Petunia saying anything about Uncle Vernon at all.

Harry doesn't bother asking him to just use the perfectly good fireplace inside the tent. He already heard him scolding Fred and George for trying to open the windows. "We must appear as muggle-like as possible." He reminded them, despite the blatant magic that fills the air around them.

"Well, it takes a bit of practice, but what you've got to do is . . ."

-

A quick learner, Mr. Weasley gets the fire started in only three more tries. Harry carefully stores the matches in his pocket, safe from Mr. Weasley's innocent destruction.

"Where should I put this?" he asks, gesturing to the pail.

"Oh, right, Ginny told me you were fetching water. You were gone a while you didn't get lost did you?"

"Oh, no. I was with Dean and Seamus."

"Good, yes, I saw Mr. Finnigan earlier. Poor man, he said he was used to all this, but these things are a bit much for anyone. He seemed alright though. He may be a muggle, but he's still Irish. Ah, right, just leave the water here, Molly packed ingredients for soup. 'Said there's no way I can mess that up. Ron and Hermione have gone to get souvenirs, you probably find them at one of the stands."

"Thanks." Harry nods and runs off again, not missing Percy telling some poor little girl and her nana off for shooting fireworks. Something about the statute of secrecy.

"All this noise? How can anyone work? Of course, Mr. Crouch is having no trouble, I must strive to be like him. I cannot be late with this report!"

-

It's easy to spot the cart of Bulgaria merchandise even through the mass of tents. The whole thing sparkles red.

"Hey!" Harry greets his friends, causing Hermione to jump.

"Harry! Where have you been? We haven't seen you since we got here." She frets over his glasses, still askew from ducking and dodging sparklers. 

"And what are you wearing?" Ron asks, aghast. he'd been eyeing the Bulgaria scarves.

"Oh, never mind that we were looking for you." Hermione continues to fret, sounding an awful lot like Mrs. Weasley, while Ron glares at Harry's gaudy Irish pride-wear. Truth be told, he'd forgotten he still had it on.

"I was just getting water for the soup." It's part of the truth. "Seamus gave me this, I didn't exactly want to say no. The Irish are scary when they're excited."

This distracts them. "Soup?" Ron's face pales slightly, "You mean, dad's cooking?"

"Yeah, is that bad or something? He said he wasn't that good but . . .?"

"Be afraid Harry, be very afraid."

-

The soup went mostly untouched, which was probably a good thing seeing as it was an odd green-ish colour despite containing only carrots, beef and potatoes and some herbs, nothing that should've resulted in that colour. In Harry's opinion, it even slightly resembled the polyjuice that he, Hermione and Ron had brewed only a year and a half ago. He thinks Hermione saw it too because she exchanged a glance with Ron as he passed her the salad.