A.N.: Sorry I haven't updated in ages! I've been spending time with my family. Strangely enough, they don't like it when I spend hours ignoring them in order to write.
I got a few comments about the whole gay/romance side of this story. A friendly reminder to all of you: there are two versions of this story. One is published here, and will be rather tame (no explicit sex), and another is published on archive of our own. The one on AO3 is the one that will eventually have all the romantic elements. I'll try to downplay the romance in this one for those of you who don't like that sort of thing, but still want to read my story. (Note: so far, the two stories are identical. I'll let you know when they diverge.) Also note that if you leave questions/comments on AO3, I can reply to them more easily.
I'm also considering rewriting the first chapter eventually as I feel it is not representative of the writing in later chapters. Does that seem like a good idea? Oh, and I sill don't have a beta... perhaps I should get one.
The school seemed conflicted over Harry's performance during the first task. On one hand, he'd received the best score of all the contestants, and it was generally acknowledged that his performance was the most spectacular. Fleur's sleeping charm, while effective, didn't seem to capture the publics imagination. Cedric's transfigured dog was, in Harry opinion, an incredibly risky plan. He was actually quite surprised the Hufflepuff scored so highly. He suspected most of the points were awarded for the impressive transfiguration, rather than the actual plan. Krum, on the other hand, had used something much more reliable, but it wasn't quite as exciting as single-handedly stunning a dragon.
And so, in spite of his reputation, the students couldn't help be feel proud. No one had seemed to make the connection between his cloak and the fire immunity, though. There was plenty of speculation. Some people seemed to think he'd found a way to temporarily become intangible, others insisted he must have performed some dark ritual to ward off the flames. The most bizarre theory he heard, though, came in the form of a direct question.
He'd been sitting in the library, searching through his spell encyclopedia for anything that might help him translate the clue, when a Ravenclaw girl sat opposite him and asked: "Are you a fire elemental?"
Harry recognized her as same girl who had asked him about the wine fountain in the chamber of secrets.
"Um... no. Not that I'm aware of."
"Are you sure? They're invulnerable to fire, you know. I thought you must be."
"Afraid not," he said with an amused smile, "I used alchemy to make a fire-eating cloak."
"Oh..." she looked slightly disappointed. "My great uncle was an alchemist. He promised to make me a hat that would change my hair colour every time I put it on, but he died in a freak tea-cosy accident before he could finish it."
She stared at his spell encyclopedia.
"That isn't anywhere near complete, you know. The 1846 edition had nearly twice as many spells, but people thought it was too heavy. Father has a copy. He uses it to press flowers."
"I'm sorry, but do you mind telling me your name?"
"Oh, yes. My name. I should tell you, I suppose. It's only polite."
She fiddled with her hair for a moment. After an uncomfortable silence, Harry cleared his throat.
"Oh, yes! It's Luna. Sorry. I was distracted by all the dust."
Harry couldn't help but laugh.
"I could make you that hat, if you like" He offered, "it should be easy enough."
"No, thank you. I like my hair the way it is. You're right, though. You're not a fire elemental. They don't like giving gifts."
Then, as abruptly as she'd arrive, Luna stood up and walked out of the library.
~§~
Having more or less finished the first item on his summer list, learning occlumency, Harry decided to move on to his next goal, finding some way to make his experiments undetectable. Skeeter's article had demonstrated quite clearly that it was all too easy to figure out what he was doing. And now that everyone knew he spent his time in abandoned classrooms playing with powerful magic, the chances that people would try to spy on him had only increased.
He dug through his trunk and retrieved the books on warding he'd purchased in Diagon alley. Then, not wanting to put of with the stares and whispers of the common room, gathered his things and made his way to a secluded corner in the back of the library.
Warding, it turned out, came in three different categories. There were reactive wards, which fed off the magic caught within them, triggered wards, which did nothing until someone activated them using their own magic, and temporary wards, which were given magic on casting, but would eventually wear out.
The runes at Hogwarts were examples of reactive wards. They had been set up during the time of the founders, and had been feeding off the magic on the grounds ever since. All the creatures in the forest, in the lake, and the various Hogwarts inhabitants helped strengthen the wards and keep them fuelled. They also fed off the ambient magic that permeates all space, but that was negligible compared to the power they gained from the magical beings on the Hogwarts grounds.
Triggered wards were less common. They had been quite popular as last resort security systems. If someone managed to breach all the other defences around someone's house, the caster could trigger the wards with a large burst of magic to activate them. They tended to have very powerful, albeit very brief, effects, and required a lot of magic to trigger.
Temporary wards were probably the most straightforward. The caster put of the wards and infused them with some of their magic. When the magic ran out, the wards would vanish. Harry decided that temporary wards would be the best place to start. He only needed wards that would stay up for a few hours. After he was done with his experiments, it didn't matter if they stayed up.
All wards depended on the same basic principle, though. Similarly to enchanting, the caster would transfer runes onto the object to be warded. However, unlike enchantments, wards required runes to be placed in multiple locations. The runes would become the corners of the wards perimeter, and everything trapped within them would be effected.
Wards also contained a feature that Harry had never seen before in any other form of spell: memory. Wards were capable of maintaining a list of people who would remain unaffected by their presence. The mechanics behind spell memory were much too complicated to decipher in a day, though. Harry suspected it would be a long time before he could use it in any original way.
That was a project for another day, though. For now, he needed to learn to ward a room to hide his experiments. Only after he gained some privacy would he be able to continue with his experiments.
~§~
As much as Harry had dreaded the first task, the Yule Ball had caused him even more worry. He would gladly have skipped it, but champions were required to attend. And so, rather than trying to solve the hint for the second task, he spent his time trying to find someone to ask to the Ball. He'd briefly toyed with the idea of asking a boy, only to decide that it wouldn't be worth it. He was subject to enough scrutiny as it was. No need to draw any more attention to himself.
In the end, he went with Luna. He didn't know her terribly well, but she seemed to be one of the only girls who could stand to be seen with him. He could probably have asked a Slytherin – the house all but worshipped him after his stunt with the fire cloak – but that would only confirm the rumours. Even though the rest of the school had long ago decided he was dark, he refused to do anything that would validate their opinion. The only indulgence he allowed himself was accepting Malfoy's help in potions, but that was just to ward off Snape's ire.
Luna, he learned, had a reputation of her own (albeit one that was far less sinister). Their appearance at the ball had caused something of a stir, but nothing compared to Harry's earlier rumours. The general wisdom was that Harry had more or less tricked Luna into going. No one else, they reasoned, would be mad enough to go with him. Luna didn't seem to mind, though. She was far more interested in the invisible creatures infesting the hall.
~§~
Weeks had passed, and Harry still hadn't decoded the hint from the egg. His first guess was that the sound was some sort of message. He'd hit it with every translation charm he could find, though, and none of them worked. His current theory was that it was the cry of some dangerous beast. Knowing what the creature was would certainly help him fight it, but he decided that he would split his time learning some spells that would be useful in combat. If he failed to identify the cry, he needed something to fall back on.
On the bright side, he was now fairly good at casting temporary wards. He'd discovered a particularly useful one that protected the walls of the room from spell damage. Since discovering the ward, he had been able to cast powerful blasting hexes, impaling curses, conjuring acid, and all manner of other dangerous combat magic without having to worry about wrecking whatever classroom he chose.
Conjuring acid was a particularly fun trick Harry had recently mastered. The name annoyed him, though, since he didn't actually conjure acid. Contrary to popular belief, conjuring didn't make something appear out of thin air. Rather, it took particles of whatever was around and rapidly duplicated them. Water was often conjured by using moisture from the air. (Harry had learned this by attempting to conjure water in a vacuum. It didn't work.) More elaborate conjuring usually involved conjuring something simple, like water, or carbon, and then transfiguring it as it was created. Conjuring acid was particularly easy for Harry, since water was a large component.
He was slightly weary of using anything too creative during the tournament, though. A lot of his more experimental magic could be dark, for all he knew. He had translated hundreds of runes, and was having great fun testing original combinations. He could do all sorts interesting things: flip objects inside-out, make objects incredibly heavy (he reversed the feather-light charm), slow things down or speed them up, make them freeze or burn from the inside, stretch them till they split in half, compress them into a dense sphere... All these things could all be useful, but a lot of them would also be fatal if cast on a human. If one of them was dark and he used it in front of the whole school there would certainly be consequences.
His schoolmates had grown even more suspicious of him. He hadn't thought it was possible, but they had. Small groups of students had formed a sort of club dedicated to tracking him down and keeping tabs on him. Ever since Skeeter had mentioned that he practiced spells in abandoned classrooms, people had speculated over what he was doing. Now, though, they were actively trying to find out. If he used something dark during the tournament, one of the Harry hunters (a name he'd appropriated from his cousin) would surely figure it out and report him.
But lamenting over that won't help me, Harry though. If I die during the second task it won't matter what anyone else thinks. With an exasperated sigh, Harry continued drilling battle spells.
~§~
Harry stood with the other champions at the edge of the lake. He'd tried everything he could to decode the egg's clue, but nothing had worked. And now time had finally run out.
The lake? Fuck... I don't know how to breath underwater! Inside, Harry was panicking. He couldn't let anyone know, though. Panic would draw attention, and attention birthed new rumours. He casually watched the other contestants. Maybe they'll use a spell I can copy... Harry discretely activated his glasses.
Ludo's voice rang out over the grounds. "Well, all our champions are ready. The second task will start on my whistle. They will each have one hour to recover what has been taken from them. On the count of three..."
Everyone removed their robes, revealing bathing suits. Harry wandlessly transfigured himself a bathing suit and mirrored them.
"One."
Cedric and Fleur raised their wands.
"Two."
Whatever Krum was going to try, it didn't use a wand, so Harry decided to focus his attention on the other two.
"Three!"
Both Cedric and Fleur cast the same spell, and Harry quickly memorized the seven runes involved. Only one of them was new, and the shape was simple enough for him to remember. The other contestants all charged into the water while Harry tried to formulate a plan.
Ludo said we had to recover something that was taken, so I need a way to navigate the lake...
He glanced at the water and noted with some satisfaction that he could quite easily follow the other contestants using their magical core. I could just follow one of them... He noticed something else, though. There appeared to be four other humans at the bottom of the lake. They were quite noticeable, actually. There was plenty of magic in the lake, but few things shone as brightly as the magical core of a witch or wizard (or goblin, or centaur... but they weren't likely to show up underwater.) Okay, that's probably what we have to save...
People were muttering int he stands, now. He could see professor Dumbledore looking at him with a worried expression.
Harry remembered an idea he had had a few weeks ago. It wasn't something he could test in a classroom, though, so he didn't know if it would work. But if it did... A grin broke out over his face.
With an excessively dramatic wand flourish, Harry cast two spells on himself. One was a modification of the feather-light charm that would make him all but weightless. The other was a partial transfiguration of his skin that made it extremely hydrophobic. Over the summer, he'd read an article about a species of ants that made rafts by interlocking their bodies. They were hydrophobic enough that they could float in spite of their weight. So, if his spells worked as he'd intended, he should be able to walk on water.
Harry took a few tentative steps into the lake and promptly fell over. He was floating on the surface, though. He tried to stand up only to topple over once more. A few of the audience members started to laugh, and Harry couldn't help but join in. Not exactly the dramatic display I was hoping for, but at least it works. I suppose I'll need a balancing charm. Harry cast the final spell on himself and carefully stood up. After a few test steps, he was confidently striding along the surface.
Wish I could use this for Quidditch, he mused. Balancing charms were banned from most sports, as they made it nearly impossible to fall over. You could attempt life-threatening manoeuvres without having to fear the consequences. The triwizard tournament wasn't "most sports", though.
Harry glanced down at the water and was pleased to find that he was making much better time than the other contestants. Humans were generally much faster when walking than they were when swimming, and they would be slowed even further by the creatures that inhabited the lake. So while the others struggled to fight off aquatic beasts, he walked safely across the surface. If it weren't for the mix of booing and cheering coming from the crowds, he might have enjoyed it.
Finally, he was standing above the four "stolen" people. He carefully cast the charm he'd seen Cedric and Fleur do, and then cancelled his other spells. The effect was immediate, and Harry was plunged into the dark waters of the lake. He cast a silent lumos and began swimming straight down.
When he arrived at the lake's bottom, he found four people tied down with chains, apparently asleep. Harry immediately recognized three of them: Luna, Hermione, and Cho Chang. The fourth was a young girl who he assumed was related to Fleur in some way. (He absently noted that it seemed a bit odd. Everyone else was rescuing their date from the Yule Ball.) Sparing no thought for the others, Harry broke Luna's chains and headed towards the surface. Once upon a time he might have tried to save Hermione as well, but now he couldn't really be bothered to care.
~§~
Harry easily won the second task. His water walking trick had allowed him to complete it in just under ten minutes, less than a fifth of the time it had taken the others. The judges had all been suitably impressed, and, once again, everyone was speculating about how he'd done it. Dark magic was the most popular hypothesis. Harry would have told any of them how he'd done it, but no one bothered to ask.
Sirius was incredibly proud of him, though. Harry's godfather had finally managed to get through his trial, and was now making plans to have the young Gryffindor move in with him. From what Sirius told Harry, Dumbledore seemed to be opposed to the idea. Harry would normally have been overjoyed by the news, but he was too worried about the third task. The champions had been informed that the final task would be a maze. There were no hints, no special ways to prepare. All Harry could do was learn as many spells as possible and hope he didn't encounter anything that he couldn't handle.
Skeeter had published another article speculating about his remarkable feats. It didn't make any concrete claims about him, but it did heavily imply that his performance made use of "spells that can't be found in any ministry sanctioned textbook." It was technically true; some of the spells he'd used weren't in any textbook. The implication was clear, though.
Harry found that his preparation schedule for the second task worked just as well for the third. He spent all his free time locked in a heavily warded classroom, practicing spells on conjured dummies and other props. He'd finally gotten around to transfiguring some more interesting substances, like graphene and aerogel. He'd toyed with the idea of using fluorine, but since it was an element as fundamental as gold, transfiguring it in large quantities was all but impossible.
Transfiguration was odd that way. As far as Harry could tell, there was no easy way to know what would be challenging to make. He'd discovered some general guidelines. Most elements were difficult, with the exception of carbon. Organic compounds were generally more demanding than inorganic ones (blood for example, was all but impossible to transfigure). But apart from that, the rules appeared to be entirely random.
Harry was currently seeing how he could transfigure the air. If he could drain a space of oxygen and use a bubble-head charm he should be able to outlast any beast that needed to breathe. It was proving remarkably difficult, however.
He was about to attempt replacing the oxygen with helium when there was a knock at the door. Harry froze. That shouldn't have been possible; the room was warded with wizard repelling wards. With a pair of wandless charms he quickly gathered his notes and packed away his equipment. Satisfied that everything was in order, he opened the door to find a very smug looking Draco Malfoy.
"My, my, Potter. You are a rather hard one to find." He sounded incredibly pleased with himself.
Harry narrowed his eyes.
"Can I help you with something, Malfoy?"
"I doubt it. I have something you might like, though."
The blond held up a scroll.
"And that is?..."
"A list of everything that will be in the final task." replied the Slytherin, "I got it from father. Said I wanted to use it to win some bets."
"People are betting on what's going to be in the maze?"
"Don't be ridiculous, Potter. People are betting on who's going to win."
