"Isn't casting the Imperius Curse on a person illegal, professor?" Terry asked, sounding flabbergasted.
Moody clacked forward and leveled his gaze on the boy. "Got a special dispensation from Dumbledore, lad. You can learn how it feels in a controlled environment, or you can leave the classroom. Just don't say I didn't warn you when a Dark wizard forces you to murder your own family!"
Terry blanched and Moody stepped back with a grunt. "When I call your name, come to the front," he said, artificial eye spinning in the direction of the register. "Well, what do you know—Boot, Terry."
The boy gulped and left his desk, dragging his feet to delay the inevitable. The look on the professor's scarred face was disturbingly eager as he raised his wand and said, "Imperio!"
A relaxed expression came over Terry's face, and he broke into a passable rendition of Celestina Warbeck's 'A Cauldron Full of Hot, Strong Love'. Several people chuckled, Harry not among them.
"Think that's funny, do you?" Moody growled, ending the spell with a flick of his wand. Terry's voice died mid-verse and he rushed back to his seat, face burning. "Once the curse takes over, the victim can be made to stab their best friend in the back... strangle their lover... anything. The control is absolute."
Quirrel's glowing red eyes flashed in Harry's mind, and his hands shook. He reached into the inner pocket of his robes and fumbled for the vial. The small glass container slipped from his fingers and clattered onto the floor.
He grimaced and bent down to pick it up, clutching the precious potion between his sweating palms until the classmates who had turned at the noise looked away. Glancing around surreptitiously, he raised the vial to his lips and took a sip.
He could do this.
Hidden under his invisibility cloak, Harry stood in a corner of the Roost, his three Ravenclaw friends peering in his direction expectantly. His right hand clutched a lumpy, spherical smoke bomb that would detonate on impact. Taking a deep breath, he chucked it at the floor between his feet.
The noise the grenade made when it went off was modest, but the amount of smoke it spewed out was anything but; in an instant, he was swallowed up by a vivid blue plume. Blinking his stinging eyes, he threw off the cloak and stepped forward with his head held high, but the pungent fumes found their way into his lungs, and he broke out in a coughing fit. He staggered outside the cloud and doubled over, his performance ruined.
Padma's nose crinkled and she waved her hand in front of her face. Su quietly cast a Bubble-Head Charm on herself before opening a window with a wave of her wand. Tony was too busy laughing to do much else.
"You should've seen your face," he choked out even as his own eyes watered from the smoke.
Grimacing, Harry straightened up. "Guess a dramatic entrance is out. I'll just have to make up for it during the task itself."
The Acromantula was so huge that its spindly legs brushed the walls of the maze as it scuttled forward. Harry directed his blade towards its numerous eyes and charged with an inarticulate battle-cry.
The gleaming sword plunged into the spider's head with little resistance, and the creature convulsed, its eight limbs curling up under its hairy body. Harry pulled the weapon out and thrust it into the soft ground to clean off the ichor.
Gingerly stepping around the Acromantula's carcass, he continued onward, holding the katana upright before him. He'd ditched the scabbard at the entrance since carrying it on his back made drawing the blade impossible, as Harry found out to his chagrin and the amusement of the onlookers. Still, the sword itself was awesome, and he just proved its effectiveness too.
"Dangerous and stupid, they said. Would lose my fingers, they said. Ha! I hope you're watching, girls. I'm a fucking badass!" He raised the katana in a salute to the unseen spectators.
Moving at a cautious pace, it took him several minutes to encounter the next obstacle. A straight stretch of the maze was blocked by a four-footed creature with a lion's hindquarters, the wings of an eagle, and a woman's head and torso. Eyeing her warily, he crept closer. Was she a sphinx? He had no idea they were quite so... majestic.
"You've done well coming this far, champion. Solve my riddle, and you may pass," the sphinx said in a rich, melodious voice. A smile graced her dignified face, although it wavered when Harry kept ogling her bare bosom. "Ahem. Eyes up here, wizardling."
"Huh? Oh, er..." Cheeks heating up, he covered his embarrassment by boldly stepping forward and brandishing his katana. "Let me through, or my demon sword Tsumayoji will taste your blood!" For a name he'd made up on the spot, it sounded rather potent and mysterious, he thought.
Her smile returned, brighter than before. "Fancy yourself a warrior, do you?"
He raised the katana over his shoulder. "I've just slain a vile Acromantula using this very blade. If you don't stand aside, you'll be next!"
The sphinx's throaty laughter echoed in the passage. Taken aback by her reaction, Harry lowered his weapon and shuffled his feet awkwardly until she was done.
"Ah, I apologize," she said, still snickering. "That was the most entertainment I've had in months. You may pass, brave champion." She gave him a half-bow, folded her wings, and stepped to the side.
Sensing that he was being mocked, Harry nevertheless proceeded ahead, pressing against the hedgerow with his back to give the sphinx a wide berth. She followed him with her hazel eyes but didn't make a move otherwise. Harry edged along until he reached a turn, breathing easier when he could no longer feel her amused gaze on his back.
"Phew. I sure am glad the spell doesn't transmit sound."
"I wish this spell relayed sound," Hermione said, eyes glued to the floating screen. "That was entirely too quick for a sphinx's riddle."
"That's 'cause he scared it away with his sword. The thing's just an oversized pussycat!"
"Honestly, Anthony, that's a class XXXX creature you're talking about. It wouldn't be intimidated by a sharpened strip of metal."
"Strip of metal? Herms, that's an authentic Japanese katana, that is," Tony said heatedly. "Their smiths fold the steel, like, a thousand times. It can cut through bullets!"
Hermione growled at the butchering of her name, and Padma snorted. "Need I remind you that you were the one who called Harry a 'category-five weeaboo' when he insisted on using that thing?"
"Meh, can't let him get too big of an ego."
"He's being attacked," Su said, her voice barely audible above the din of the crowd.
The group focused on the screen, which showed Harry facing one of Hagrid's Blast-Ended Skrewts: a massive arthropod that had grown to be at least six feet long and was fully covered in grey armor. Its serrated pincers snapped eagerly at the air as it barreled forward.
Harry raised his sword high above his head, tip down, and made to skewer the charging beast, but the blade glanced off its carapace, and he was knocked down. The audience around them gasped.
"Looks like he nicked his leg," Tony said conversationally. "What a pillock."
"I told him, I told him it was too dangerous," Hermione wailed, wringing her hands.
"It's probably not that bad," Padma tried to reassure her. She saw Su bite her lip, and gave her hand a squeeze. "He learned that Episkey spell, didn't he?"
Harry was getting up now, leaning on his sword for support. The Skrewt's reckless assault had taken the creature some distance behind him, but instead of turning around and charging anew, it was raising its rear in a manner that was unmistakable to anyone who heard the rumors about Hagrid's classes.
Harry withdrew his wand and launched a powerful surge of water right before the unholy hybrid let one rip. Steam burst out, and the whole scene was hidden from view.
Tony groaned. "Not again."
"At least they put the viewing charm on the maze itself this time," Padma said. "Harry won't disappear on us no matter what he does."
Harry limped forward, nose wrinkled at the lingering stench from the Skrewt's fart-explosion. He didn't come out of the scuffle unscathed, as evidenced by the inexpertly bandaged puncture wound on his calf, but that by itself wasn't so bad considering the perilous nature of the Tournament. No, the worst part was that the injury was self-inflicted; he could already imagine Hermione's and Padma's smug I-told-you-sos. Perhaps he'd ask Dumbledore for sword-fighting tips when things calmed down.
He had discarded the damaged weapon, deciding that facing an armored beast with a katana hadn't been one of his brightest ideas, and defeated the Skrewt with a handy combination of Flipendo and a couple of Stunners to its unprotected belly. If anyone asked, he was going to claim that he purposely gave himself a handicap in attempting to tackle the task armed with a sword alone—the reporters would surely eat that up.
He trudged through the maze for a few minutes, not encountering any more monsters nor traps, until he arrived in a clearing. In its middle stood a pedestal, upon which rested the Triwizard Cup, tempting him with its golden sheen. He grinned and hobbled towards it at a pace that didn't hurt his leg too badly.
The hedges on the opposite side of the glade rustled, and Cedric Diggory emerged from one of the passages. Harry paused, and they stared at each other without a word.
"Accio," Harry said, jabbing his wand at the cup. The trophy didn't so much as budge. "Fuck."
They broke into a run at the same time, but while he was a lot closer, Cedric's uninjured legs carried him faster. Harry gritted his teeth and sprinted, keeping his eyes on the goal and doing his best to endure the sharp twinge that made itself known every time his left foot struck the ground. A thousand Galleons and epic bragging rights were worth a little suffering.
His fingers grasped the handle of the trophy at the same time Cedric seized the one opposite. He was about to complain, to shout that he was first, but there was a jerk behind his navel, and he was pulled skyward at a dizzying speed. Wind howled in his ears and indistinct flashes of color filled his eyes before the Portkey spat them out on the ground.
Letting go of the handle, he tried to stand, groaning in pain when his injured leg protested the abuse. To his credit, Cedric helped him up after only a moment's hesitation.
Harry looked around, fingers tightening on his wand. They were surrounded by mossy, overgrown tombstones which cast long shadows on the weedy ground. A crumbling chapel stood nearby, and he caught sight of a dilapidated country house behind a hill. There were no people around as far as he could see.
"Did you know the cup was a Portkey?" Cedric asked, regarding the abandoned graveyard with suspicion.
"I don't think it was supposed to be." Harry scanned their surroundings again, expecting to be assaulted at any second. "Diggory, remember when you asked me how I got my name in, and I told you I used a fishing pole?"
Cedric spared him a glance. "Yeah?"
"I lied. Somebody, probably a follower of Voldemort, put my name in to—well, kidnap me, apparently. You just stumbled into their trap along with me."
"We're in deep trouble," Cedric summed up the situation. "What now? I can't get us out, Apparition's blocked."
"You know the Disillusionment Charm?" Harry asked, lifting his wand above his head. "I figure we try to sneak away and—argh!" The blinding pain in his scar sent him to his knees.
"Potter!" He felt Cedric's arm on his shoulder. "You alright?"
"Run," Harry said through clenched teeth. "Diggory, it's him—hide yourself!"
He saw a robed figure approach with labored, uneven steps; tears blurred his vision, but he was able to distinguish a bundle of cloth in its arms. The pain increased, and Harry clutched his head, feeling as if it was being split in two.
"Kill the spare," a cold, harsh voice said.
"Avada Kedavra!" the figure snarled, and Harry's eyes widened, for he'd heard the same voice pronounce that incantation in the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom scarcely a month ago.
The jet of green light rushed towards Cedric who dived to the ground, the deadly spell colliding with a gravestone and shattering it into pieces. Harry exhaled in relief, then glared at the attacker, who was indeed no one else but Professor Moody.
The grizzled wizard didn't waste breath on words, hobbling forward as he unleashed one spell after another at Cedric. The boy kept himself low, taking cover behind unbroken tombstones which were rapidly dwindling in number.
Harry scrambled for the wand he'd dropped earlier. His headache receded; it was as though the attention of the presence was elsewhere for the moment.
"Stupefy," he whispered, hand shaking as he went through the familiar motions. The spell came out dim, weakened by his imprecision, but another one was already on his lips.
Moody's electric-blue eye rotated towards him and he reacted with swiftness Harry could only envy, swatting the attacks away with two flicks of his wrist. Face twisted in anger, the man retaliated with a Blasting Curse which Harry managed to duck under, yet he was sent sprawling when the gravestone behind him exploded.
Ears ringing, he got on all fours and shook his head. He lifted his gaze to see Moody point his wand at him and dropped to the ground again as all strength left his body. With his muscles paralyzed, he could only gasp in pain when he was trussed up by thick iron chains.
A cerulean hex hurtled towards Moody, who didn't act in time. The spell hit a metallic flask hanging from the man's belt and it burst open, showering him with greyish gunk. He roared in fury and began firing in the direction the hex had come from, the ensuing blasts so powerful they reverberated in Harry's skull.
He couldn't even turn his head—his muscles outright refused to obey—but he could see an occasional counterattack from Cedric out of the corner of his eye. The true Hogwarts champion darted in and out of cover, firing back whenever there was a lull in Moody's spellcasting.
Harry saw Cedric crouch behind a weathered obelisk and point his wand at the ground. The soil surged upwards and shaped itself into a small dog, which raced towards Moody at its creator's silent command. The transfigured beast leapt forward and bit down on the wooden leg with a growl.
Moody swore and aimed his wand downwards. His fake eye, however, was peering in a different direction.
"He can see you!" Harry yelled, his own voice sounding muted to his deafened ears.
Cedric, who stood up to attack the moment Moody appeared to be distracted, stumbled backwards at the warning. Not bothering to face his opponent, Moody brought up his wand and unleashed a crackling white spell which arced like lightning, connecting the tip of his wand with the ground in front of his target. Cedric was blown off his feet, wand soaring from his hand; its direction changed mid-flight to end up between Moody's gnarled fingers.
Harry frantically tried to bend his neck and succeeded in moving a fraction of an inch. He saw Cedric crawl, then get up and run, ducking behind the windowless chapel as spells whizzed past his head.
"Shall I pursue, Master?" Moody asked, looking down at the bundle in his arms.
"No," Voldemort rasped. "He's bleeding, wandless, and our wards extend for miles."
"And the disguise..."
"Perhaps it's for the best... we cannot risk any interference with the ceremony. Make the preparations." The cloth shifted as if the creature inside was squirming. "No more blunders, Crouch."
Moody bowed and started walking towards Harry, whose headache intensified with each ungainly step the man took. His body was still unresponsive, fingers barely twitching despite his utmost effort. Gritting his teeth and straining so hard it felt like his eyes were going to pop out, he struggled to push his wand out through the chains.
Moody, or rather Crouch, flicked his wand at him and Harry rose into the air; the chains clanked and shifted, and his own wand slid out through a gap and fell softly onto the grass. His captor didn't notice, the artificial eye spinning to survey their surroundings.
The memory of the ritual would haunt Harry in his nightmares for years to come. Bound to a stone statue, he could only watch helplessly as Voldemort's servant toiled to resurrect his master.
No longer wearing the appearance of a hardened Auror, Crouch had resumed his true form of a scraggy young man with a fanatical gleam in his eyes. He lit a fire under an enormous rune-etched cauldron before filling it with conjured water and potions he'd retrieved from inside his robes. Harry's eyes narrowed as he recalled Snape's incessant complaints about ingredients missing from his stores.
He was startled out of his thoughts when Crouch unwrapped the bundle of cloth and gently lowered Voldemort's feeble body into the liquid, the Dark Lord's malevolent eyes meeting Harry's for one painful instant. The graveyard seemed to darken even as the concoction in the cauldron grew brighter. Acrid smell of ozone tickled Harry's nostrils, and he could practically feel the gathering magic with his skin.
Crouch wore an ecstatic expression as he raised his arms. "Bone of the father, unknowingly given, you will renew your son!" Earth trembled and a puff of dust rose from a nearby grave, swooping into the cauldron.
The Death Eater pulled out a curved obsidian dagger, and Harry whimpered. He'd had time to think about his role in the proceedings, and sacrifice was the obvious conclusion.
Crouch didn't even acknowledge him as he spoke the next line. "Flesh of the servant, willingly sacrificed, you will revive your master!"
The demented smile on the man's gaunt face never wavered as he extended his arm over the cauldron and sliced off his hand in one smooth stroke. The limb fell into the potion with a splash, and Crouch sank to his knees with a strangled scream.
"Fucking hell," Harry breathed. Crouch turned his burning gaze at him and his fear spiked. "S-sorry—didn't mean to interrupt."
Crouch rose with a snarl and stepped towards him, paying no heed to the blood soaking the sleeve of his robes. Harry struggled in vain against the statue's stony embrace.
"I admit, you got the virgin part right," he gasped, "but isn't it customary to use maidens for this kind of thing?"
Crouch didn't so much as blink, raising the black dagger in his remaining hand. Its tip hovered an inch from Harry's shoulder.
Harry stilled, his eyes widening. The air behind Crouch was distorted, and a large rock floated above the man's head.
"Hey," he said, licking his cracked lips, "behind you."
Crouch just sneered at him and opened his mouth. "Blood of the enemy—"
The rock smashed into his skull with a dull thud, and he collapsed in a heap.
Harry barked a laugh. "Told you."
The shimmering outline in the air wavered and Cedric emerged from his imperfect Disillusionment. He muttered a Stupefy at Crouch's unmoving form, then frowned in concentration as he forced the statue to release its hold on Harry.
He staggered away and flexed his numb fingers. "Took you long enough."
"I was waiting for an opportune moment," Cedric said. "Right after this lunatic chopped his hand off seemed good." Face pale and robes bedraggled, he was nevertheless grinning as he handed Harry his wand.
"Cheers." The wand hummed in his hand, spurting out consecutive sprays of sparks. "Oh yeah, that's the stuff."
Cedric stooped down to rifle through Crouch's pockets. "It barely worked for me. What core is it?"
"Dragon."
"That's odd, I nearly settled on heartstring myself back at Ollivander's."
"Mine needs a gentle but firm touch." Harry jabbed it at the inanimate Death Eater and added a second Stupefy.
While Cedric was busy retrieving and reuniting with his own wand, Harry slunk towards the cauldron and craned his neck to peek over its edge. The silvery glow made it impossible to see the bottom, but his worsening headache indicated that Voldemort was still inside.
"Is—is it really You-Know-Who in there?" Cedric asked, keeping his distance.
Harry kicked the stone vessel. "Yep. Bastard's stuck in the middle of a ritual... I'm thinking of a way to disrupt it."
Cedric clasped his shoulder and tried to pull him back. "Are you mad? This isn't the sort of magic we can deal with! Let's get out of here and call for help."
Harry shrugged his hand off. "Sorry, Cedric, I'm not wasting this chance. Not when he's vulnerable."
Diggory retreated a few steps. "You are the Boy-Who-Lived," he said quietly. "I hope you know what you're doing."
"Yeah, I got this. You might want to stand back a bit more." Harry unzipped his fly and reached for his other wand. "Piss of the enemy, readily excreted, you will drown your foe... Ahh."
"What the actual..." Cedric trailed off.
The mixture started frothing, and Harry hastily shook himself off and zipped up before stepping back. Yellowish steam spewed from the concoction, and its light went out as Voldemort's body floated up. A black shade erupted from the malformed homunculus with an angry wail, soaring upward before lunging at Cedric.
The boy yelped and ducked, but the spirit passed him by. It darted towards the prone Death Eater, the smoky blackness seeping up his nose, mouth, and ears. The unconscious body shuddered and its eyes shot open, glowing red in the darkness.
Harry was already midway through the motion for a Stunner. "Stupefy! Stop him!"
Voldemort contorted the possessed body in a fashion that shouldn't have been humanly possible and evaded the spell, then blew a stream of flames launched by Cedric away with a contemptuous snap of his fingers. He reached into his servant's pocket and drew a wand halfway out before his eyes widened and he leapt backwards to avoid Harry's wild haymaker.
Abandoning any pretense of finesse, Harry simply charged with his hands extended. The Dark Lord gave him one last, hateful glare before Disapparating with an earsplitting crack. Momentum carrying him ahead, Harry tumbled to the ground. He was rather getting used to the taste of good old British grass.
Cedric walked up and helped him to his feet, wand outstretched in his right hand. "Merlin's beard—did You-Know-Who just run away from you?"
"What a little bitch, huh?" Harry chuckled nervously as his eyes darted around the darkness. "We should get out of here—any ideas?"
Cedric furrowed his brows in concentration before his face lit up. "The wards are down! Here, grab my arm."
He did as asked, and Cedric screwed up his eyes and spun on the spot, dragging him along. He felt like he was being pulled through an other-dimensional garden hose before getting ejected in front of the Hogwarts gates.
"Avery, Nott, Crabbe, Goyle, Macnair," Harry listed off. "Oh, and that Luscious chap as well."
"Lucius Malfoy?" Dumbledore asked. The headmaster's face was grim and tired, which wasn't surprising considering it was three hours past midnight.
"Yeah, the one with the hair." Harry winced and rubbed his scar. It had tormented him the entire night until the pain culminated in a vision of Voldemort resurrecting himself with the help of Peter Pettigrew and blood stolen from the real Alastor Moody.
Dumbledore leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. "Get some rest, Harry. I shall make the calls in the morning."
"Will Fudge listen this time?" he asked morosely.
The headmaster shook his head. "The Death Eaters you mentioned are regarded as upstanding citizens in our society. No, I shall be contacting my dear friends and comrades from the First War."
Harry blinked. "The first war, sir?"
"Indeed," Dumbledore said. "I believe tonight marks the beginning of the second."
Harry paced in front of the locked hospital wing. He received word that Cedric was back from St. Mungo's, where he'd been whisked off to after Madam Pomfrey detected nerve damage in his arm. The treatment required specialized potions that the mediwitch didn't have on hand, and the boy's father insisted he be moved to the nation's best hospital. Now that Cedric was discharged, Harry reckoned the ever-fastidious Madam Pomfrey wanted to give him a checkup of her own before letting him go.
The doors opened at last, releasing Cedric in his casual robes. He saw Harry and stiffened up.
"Hey, mate," Harry said with a grin. "How's it hanging?"
"Hello, Potter." The other boy nodded and began walking.
"Back to 'Potter', huh? Fair enough." Harry caught up and fell in step. "How was the hospital? Did you speak to any Ministry people?"
"Minister Fudge delivered my half of the winnings in person," Cedric said, not meeting his eyes.
He held his breath. "And?"
"I told him how the Portkey dumped us in the countryside, naturally. The Minister promised to find the prankster responsible."
Harry frowned. "What about the Death Eater guzzling Moody juice?"
Cedric came to a halt, considering him with a guarded expression. "They warned me you'd try something like that. Look, Potter, I don't know what your game is, but I want no part of it. Sharing the first place in the Triwizard Tournament should be enough fame for anyone."
Harry gaped at his fellow champion. "What are you even talking about? Cedric? Cedric, wait up!"
The boy stuck his hands into his pockets and quickened his pace. "Leave me alone, you maniac!"
"You bashed Crouch over the head with a rock!" Harry yelled at his retreating back. "I pissed in Voldemort's cauldron!"
Cedric broke into a run, leaving a baffled Harry behind.