The Girl Who Lived

Pranks and Dragons

"Come on!" Fred whispered. I could barely contain my excitement. We were going to prank Ron into thinking that Mione had given him a box of chocolates, but really it was a 'special treat.' I got to decide which potion to put in the chocolates.
Of course, I picked Confusing Concoction. A Confusing Concoction will cause the drinker to become confused, distracted and sick.
So we stole got a box of chocolates from the kitchens, and while Fred and I brewed up the potion, George started poking holes in the bottom of the chocolates.
When we finished, it was a deep green color.
"We only need a little bit, so don't get carried away," Fred instructed his twin.
"Ok, Freddie."
George put a drop off the liquid intuition each chocolate and I wrote a note that said "Enjoy!" It didn't say it was from Mione, but I'm great at faking handwriting.
Fred runs upstairs to put the candies on Ron's bed.
"Oh crap! I forgot! I need to be somewhere. Thank you both so much. Tell me if you see him!" I run out of the common room and put off the school.
I run to the forbidden Forest, and find Draco sitting there, waiting for me.
"I'm so sorry Draco! I was-"
"Busy. Yeah I know," Draco glares at me.
"Fine then, I'll just not waste my time with you."
I turn around to go back inside, but he stops me. "I'm sorry, I shouldnt have said that."
I turn around to face him. "So what did you want."
"To apologise. For hurting Hermione and Harry."
I gasp. "Why don't you just apologize to them. I won't be a freaking messenger."
I walked back to Hogwarts.
I really did not want to be on bad terms with Malfoy, but he deserved it.
The next day, Ron was really tired, and honest to God, he seemed drunk.
He walked down to the common room in the morning while Fred, George, send I were planning our next prank.
"W-wheres Hermome?" He pronounced her name Her-mome-ee.
We all laughed.
"Sleeping."
"I need a-a thing."
"What thing?" I ask innocently.
"A thing t-that... What was I saying?"
"How you are in love with Hermione," George said sweetly.
"I-i said that out loud?"
"Yep," Fred smirks.
Ron goes back up to bed, oblivious of the potion.
We all start laughing. "Nice potion choice, H!"
~*~*~
During the next week, life became even worse for me within the confines of the castle, for Rita Skeeter had published her piece about the Triwizard Tournament, and it had turned out to be not so much a report on the tournament as a highly colored life story of me. Much of the front page had been given over to a picture of me; the article (continuing on pages two, six, and seven) had been all about me, the names of the Beauxbatons and Durmstrang champions (misspelled) had been squashed into the last line of the article, and Cedric hadn't been mentioned at all.
The article had appeared ten days ago, and I still got a sick, burning feeling of shame in my stomach every time I thought about it. Rita Skeeter had reported me saying an awful lot of things that I couldn't remember ever saying in my life, let alone in that broom cupboard.
I suppose I get my strength from my parents. I know they'd be very proud of me if they could see me now. . . . Yes, sometimes at night I still cry about them, I'm not ashamed to admit it. . . . I know nothing will hurt me during the tournament, because they're watching over me. . . .
But Rita Skeeter had gone even further than transforming my "er's" into long, sickly sentences: She had interviewed other people about me too.
Heather has at last found love at Hogwarts. Her close friend, Colin Creevey, says that Heather is rarely seen out of the company of one Ron Weasley, a pure-blood boy who, like Heather, is one of the top students in the school.
From the moment the article had appeared, I had had to endure people — Slytherins, mainly — quoting it at me as I passed and making sneering comments.
"Want a hanky, Potter, in case you start crying in Transfiguration?"
"Since when have you been one of the top students in the school, Potter? Or is this a school you and Longbottom have set up together?"
"Hey — Heather!"
"Yeah, that's right!" I found myself shouting as I wheeled around in the corridor, having had just about enough. "I've just been crying my eyes out over my dead mum, and I'm just off to do a bit more. . . ."
"No — it was just — you dropped your quill."
It was Cho. I felt the color rising in his face.
"Oh — right — sorry," I muttered, taking the quill back.
"Er . . . good luck on Tuesday," she said. "I really hope you do well."
I smiled. "Thanks, Cho. I hope we can be friends. Sorry about that."
Which left me feeling extremely stupid
Ron had come in for his fair share of unpleasantness too, and he too started yelling at innocent bystanders.
I don't get why they said I was always with Ron. He wasn't even talking to me just because I'm a champion!
Harry was furious with me and Ron; he went from one to the other, trying to force us to talk to each other, but I was adamant: I would talk to Ron again only if Ron admitted that I hadn't put his name in the Goblet of Fire and apologized for calling me a liar.
"I didn't start this," I said stubbornly. "It's his problem."
"You miss him!" Harry said impatiently. "And I know he misses you —"
"Miss him?" I said. "I don't miss him. . . ."
But this was a downright lie. I liked Harry very much, but he just wasn't the same as Ron. There was much less laughter with Harry. To be honest, I didn't like Ron, he was just of of my best friends, and i missed him. Besides, I had a crush on someone else.
I still hadn't mastered Summoning Charms, I seemed to have developed something of a block about them, and Hermione insisted that learning the theory would help. We consequently spent a lot of time poring over books during our lunchtimes.
Viktor Krum was in the library an awful lot too, and I wondered what he was up to. Was he studying, or was he looking for things to help him through the first task? Hermione often complained about Krum being there — not that he ever bothered us — but because groups of giggling girls often turned up to spy on him from behind bookshelves, and Hermione found the noise distracting.
"He's not even good-looking!" she muttered angrily, glaring at Krum's sharp profile. "They only like him because he's famous! They wouldn't look twice at him if he couldn't do that Wonky- Faint thing —"
"Wronski Feint," i sighed. Quite apart from liking to get Quidditch terms correct, it caused me another pang to imagine Ron's expression if he could have heard Hermione talking about Wonky-Faints.
It is a strange thing, but when you are dreading something, and would give anything to slow down time, it has a disobliging habit of speeding up. The days until the first task seemed to slip by as though someone had fixed the clocks to work at double speed. My feeling of barely controlled panic was with me wherever I went, as everpresent as the snide comments about the Daily Prophet article.
On the Saturday before the first task, all students in the third year and above were permitted to visit the village of Hogsmeade. Mione told me that it would do me good to get away from the castle for a bit, and I didn't need much persuasion.
"What about Ron, though?" I said. "Don't you want to go with him?"
"Oh . . . well . . ." she went slightly pink. "I thought we might meet up with him and Harry in the Three Broomsticks. . . ."
"No," I said flatly.
"Oh Heather, this is so stupid —"
"I'll come, but I'm not meeting Ron, and I'm wearing Harry's Invisibility Cloak."
"Oh all right then . . ." Hermione snapped, "but I hate talking to anyone in that cloak, I never know if I'm looking at you or not."
So I put on the Invisibility Cloak in the dormitory, went back downstairs, and together Miond and I set off for
Hogsmeade.
I felt wonderfully free under the cloak; I watched other students walking past them as they entered the village, most of them sporting Support Cedric Diggory! badges, but no horrible remarks came my way for a change, and nobody was quoting that stupid article.
"People keep looking at me now," said Mione grumpily as they came out of Honeydukes Sweetshop later, eating large creamfilled chocolates. "They think I'm talking to myself."
"Don't move your lips so much then."
"Come on, please just take off your cloak for a bit, no one's going to bother you here."
"Oh yeah?" I sighed. "Look behind you."
Rita Skeeter and her photographer friend had just emerged from the Three Broomsticks pub. Talking in low voices, they passed right by Hermione without looking at her. I backed into the wall of Honeydukes to stop Rita Skeeter from hitting him with her crocodile-skin handbag. When they were gone, Harry said, "She's staying in the village. I bet she's coming to watch the first task."
As I said it, my stomach flooded with a wave of molten panic. I didn't mention this; me and Hermione hadn't discussed what was coming in the first task much; I had the feeling she didn't want to think about it.
"She's gone," said Hermione, looking right through me toward the end of the street. "Why don't we go and have a butterbeer in the Three Broomsticks, it's a bit cold, isn't it? You don't have to talk to Ron!" she added irritably, correctly interpreting his silence.
The Three Broomsticks was packed, mainly with Hogwarts students enjoying their free afternoon, but also with a variety of magical people I rarely saw anywhere else. I supposed that as Hogsmeade was the only all-wizard village in Britain, it was a bit of a haven for creatures like hags, who were not as adept as wizards at disguising themselves.
It was very hard to move through crowds in the Invisibility Cloak, in case you accidentally trod on someone, which tended to lead to awkward questions. I edged slowly toward a spare table in the corner while Mione went to buy drinks. I took off my cloak. On my way through the pub, i had spotted Ron, who was sitting with Fred, George, Harry, and Lee Jordan.
I really wanted to join them, but Ron was there.
Mione joined me a moment later and slipped me a butterbeer.
"Look, it's Hagrid!" said Hermione.
The back of Hagrid's enormous shaggy head — he had mercifully abandoned his bunches — emerged over the crowd. I wondered why he hadn't spotted him at once, as Hagrid was so large, but standing up carefully, I saw that Hagrid had been leaning low, talking to Professor Moody. Hagrid had his usual enormous tankard in front of him, but Moody was drinking from his hip flask. Madam Rosmerta, the pretty landlady, didn't seem to think much of this; she was looking askance at Moody as she collected glasses from tables around them. Perhaps she thought it was an insult to her mulled mead, but I knew better. Moody had told them all during their last Defense Against the Dark Arts lesson that he preferred to prepare his own food and drink at all times, as it was so easy for Dark wizards to poison an unattended cup.
As I watched, he saw Hagrid and Moody get up to leave.
Moody, however, paused, his magical eye on the corner where I was standing. He tapped Hagrid in the small of the back (being unable to reach his shoulder), muttered something to him, and then the pair of them made their way back across the pub toward Harry and Hermione's table.
"All right, Hermione? Heather?" said Hagrid loudly.
"Hello," said Hermione, smiling back.
Moody limped around the table and bent down; I thought he was reading the S.P.E.W. notebook, until he muttered, "Nice cloak, Potter."
Hagrid now bent down on the pretext of reading the S.P.E.W. notebook as well, and said in a whisper so low that only I could hear it, "Heather, meet me tonight at midnight at me cabin. Wear that cloak."
Straightening up, Hagrid said loudly, "Nice ter see yeh, Hermione, Heather," winked, and departed. Moody followed him.
"Why does Hagrid want me to meet him at midnight?" I said, very surprised.
"Does he?" said Hermione, looking startled. "I wonder what he's up to?"
At half past eleven that evening, I, who had pretended to go up to bed early, pulled the Invisibility Cloak back over myself and crept back downstairs through the common room. Quite a few people were still in there. The Creevey brothers had managed to get hold of a stack of Support Cedric Diggory! badges and were trying to bewitch them to make them say Support Heather Potter! instead. So far, however, all they had managed to do was get the badges stuck on POTTER STINKS. I crept past them to the portrait hole and waited for a minute or so, keeping an eye on his watch. Then Hermione opened the Fat Lady for him from outside as they had planned. I slipped past her with a whispered "Thanks!" and set off through the castle.
The grounds were very dark. I walked down the lawn toward the lights shining in Hagrid's cabin. The inside of the enormous Beauxbatons carriage was also lit up; I could hear Madame Maxime talking inside it as he knocked on Hagrid's front door.
"You there, Heather?" Hagrid whispered, opening the door and looking around.
"Yeah," I said, slipping inside the cabin and pulling the cloak down off my head. "What's up?"
"Got summat ter show yeh," said Hagrid.
There was an air of enormous excitement about Hagrid. He was wearing a flower that resembled an oversized artichoke in his buttonhole. It looked as though he had abandoned the use of axle grease, but he had certainly attempted to comb his hair — I could see the comb's broken teeth tangled in it.
"What're you showing me?" Harry said warily, wondering if the skrewts had laid eggs, or Hagrid had managed to buy another giant three-headed dog off a stranger in a pub.
"Come with me, keep quiet, an' keep yerself covered with that cloak," said Hagrid. "We won' take Fang, he won' like it. . . ."
"Listen, Hagrid, I can't stay long. . . . I've got to be back up at the castle by one o'clock —"
But Hagrid wasn't listening; he was opening the cabin door and striding off into the night. I hurried to follow and found, to his great surprise, that Hagrid was leading him to the Beauxbatons carriage.
"Hagrid, what — ?"
"Shhh!" said Hagrid, and he knocked three times on the door bearing the crossed golden wands.
Madame Maxime opened it. She was wearing a silk shawl wrapped around her massive shoulders. She smiled when she saw Hagrid.
"Ah, 'Agrid . . . it is time?"
"Bong-sewer," said Hagrid, beaming at her, and holding out a hand to help her down the golden steps.
Madame Maxime closed the door behind her, Hagrid offered her his arm, and they set off around the edge of the paddock containing Madame Maxime's giant winged horses, with me, totally bewildered, running to keep up with them. Had Hagrid wanted to show me Madame Maxime? I could see her any old time I wanted . . . she wasn't exactly hard to miss. . . .
But it seemed that Madame Maxime was in for the same treat as me, because after a while she said playfully, "Wair is it you are taking me, 'Agrid?"
"Yeh'll enjoy this," said Hagrid gruffly, "worth seein', trust me. On'y — don' go tellin' anyone I showed yeh, right? Yeh're not s'posed ter know."
"Of course not," said Madame Maxime, fluttering her long black eyelashes.
And still they walked, I getting more and more irritated as he jogged along in their wake, checking my watch every now and then. Hagrid had some harebrained scheme in hand. If they didn't get there soon, I was going to turn around, go straight back to the castle, and leave Hagrid to enjoy his moonlit stroll with Madame Maxime. . . .
But then — when we had walked so far around the perimeter of the forest that the castle and the lake were out of sight — I heard something. Men were shouting up ahead . . . then came a deafening, earsplitting roar. . . .
Hagrid led Madame Maxime around a clump of trees and came to a halt. I hurried up alongside them — for a split second, i thought I was seeing bonfires, and men darting around them — and then my mouth fell open.
Dragons.
Four fully grown, enormous, vicious-looking dragons were rearing onto their hind legs inside an enclosure fenced with thick planks of wood, roaring and snorting — torrents of fire were shooting into the dark sky from their open, fanged mouths, fifty feet above the ground on their outstretched necks. There was a silvery-blue one with long, pointed horns, snapping and snarling at the wizards on the ground; a smooth-scaled green one, which was writhing and stamping with all its might; a red one with an odd fringe of fine gold spikes around its face, which was shooting mushroom-shaped fire clouds into the air; and a gigantic black one, more lizard-like than the others, which was nearest to them.
At least thirty wizards, seven or eight to each dragon, were attempting to control them, pulling on the chains connected to heavy leather straps around their necks and legs. Mesmerized, I looked up, high above me, and saw the eyes of the black dragon, with vertical pupils like a cat's, bulging with either fear or rage, I couldn't tell which. . . . It was making a horrible noise, a yowling, screeching scream. . . .
"Keep back there, Hagrid!" yelled a wizard near the fence, straining on the chain he was holding. "They can shoot fire at a range of twenty feet, you know! I've seen this Horntail do forty!"
"Is'n' it beautiful?" said Hagrid softly.
"It's no good!" yelled another wizard. "Stunning Spells, on the count of three!"
I saw each of the dragon keepers pull out his wand.
"Stupefy!" they shouted in unison, and the Stunning Spells shot into the darkness like fiery rockets, bursting in showers of stars on the dragons' scaly hides —
I watched the dragon nearest to them teeter dangerously on its back legs; its jaws stretched wide in a silent howl; its nostrils were suddenly devoid of flame, though still smoking — then, very slowly, it fell. Several tons of sinewy, scaly-black dragon hit the ground with a thud that I could have sworn made the trees behind me quake.
The dragon keepers lowered their wands and walked forward to their fallen charges, each of which was the size of a small hill. They hurried to tighten the chains and fasten them securely to iron pegs, which they forced deep into the ground with their wands.
"Wan' a closer look?" Hagrid asked Madame Maxime excitedly. The pair of them moved right up to the fence, and I followed. The wizard who had warned Hagrid not to come any closer turned, and I realized who it was: Charlie Weasley.
I smiled. Charlie was nice, and if he was involved with these dragons, whatever they were for, then the dragons may as well be harmless.
"All right, Hagrid?" he panted, coming over to talk. "They should be okay now — we put them out with a Sleeping Draft on the way here, thought it might be better for them to wake up in the dark and the quiet — but, like you saw, they weren't happy, not happy at all —"
"What breeds you got here, Charlie?" said Hagrid, gazing at the closest dragon, the black one, with something close to reverence. Its eyes were still just open. I could see a strip of gleaming yellow beneath its wrinkled black eyelid.
"This is a Hungarian Horntail," said Charlie. "There's a Common Welsh Green over there, the smaller one — a Swedish ShortSnout, that blue-gray — and a Chinese Fireball, that's the red."
Charlie looked around; Madame Maxime was strolling away around the edge of the enclosure, gazing at the stunned dragons.
"I didn't know you were bringing her, Hagrid," Charlie said, frowning. "The champions aren't supposed to know what's coming — she's bound to tell her student, isn't she?"
Then it hit me - this was one of the tasks. We had to fight dragons. I can't wait to tell Mione and Fred and George.
"Four . . ." said Hagrid, "so it's one fer each o' the champions, is it? What've they gotta do — fight 'em?"
"Just get past them, I think," said Charlie. "We'll be on hand if it gets nasty, Extinguishing Spells at the ready. They wanted nesting mothers, I don't know why . . . but I tell you this, I don't envy the one who gets the Horntail. Vicious thing. Its back end's as dangerous as its front, look."
Charlie pointed toward the Horntail's tail, and I saw long, bronze-colored spikes protruding along it every few inches.
With my luck, I'll get that one.
Then he said, "How's Heather?"
"Fine," said Hagrid. He was still gazing at the eggs.
"Just hope she's still fine after she's faced this lot," said Charlie grimly, looking out over the dragons' enclosure. "I didn't dare tell Mum what she's got to do for the first task; she's already having kittens about him. . . ." Charlie imitated his mother's anxious voice. "'How could they let her enter that tournament, she's much too young! I thought they were all safe, I thought there was going to be an age limit!' She was in floods after that Daily Prophet article about him. 'She still cries about her parents! Oh bless her, I never knew!' "
I had had enough. Trusting to the fact that Hagrid wouldn't miss me, with the attractions of four dragons and Madame Maxime to occupy him, I turned silently and began to walk away, back to the castle.
I didn't know whether I was glad I'd seen what was coming or not. Perhaps this way was better. The first shock was over now. Maybe if I'd seen the dragons for the first time on Tuesday, I would have passed out cold in front of the whole school . . . but maybe I would anyway. . . . I was going to be armed with his wand — which, just now, felt like nothing more than a narrow strip of wood — against a fifty-foot-high, scaly, spike-ridden, fire- breathing dragon. And I had to get past it. With everyone watching. How?
Then it hit me. I knew who I could go to, who I could trust with my life.
Fred and George.