Note: If anyone knows how to disable Guest reviews, shoot me a PM. I can't for the life of me figure it out. And if I can't, well, I'd like to know that, too.

Anyway, on with the story!

CHAPTER THIRTEEN: TOURNAMENTS AFLAME, IV

Harry knew something was up the moment Professor McGonagall asked him to hold back after class ended. However, she wouldn't tell him what it was until everyone else had left. So he had plenty of time to come up with a number of horrible things.

He couldn't help it, his mind raced; everything that could have gone wrong in the last twenty four hours racing to the front of his thoughts and screaming at him. "Pro-professor." he said, voice choked and tight, so he cleared his throat and tried again. "What's going on? Is everyone all right? Is-"

McGonagall held up a hand, stopping him mid-ramble. "Everyone's fine, Mister Potter. This, I'm afraid is Tournament business."

"Oh, thank God." he sighed, relaxed, and sank back into his chair. Across from him McGonagall arched an eyebrow. "Sorry, professor."

"Quite all right." she assured him. "Now the reason I asked you to stay behind is because you are one of the champions. Unwilling or not, your presence is required at the opening of the Yule Ball. This means that you and your date will have to be present in the Entrance Hall with the other champions ahead of time."

Well, that's just- just...aw, crap.

"Professor," Harry groaned. "you're saying that I not only have to dance- which I have no idea how to do, by the way- in front of three hundred people, give or take, but I have to convince some poor girl to be up there with me while I make a fool of myself? Are you trying to make me miserable?"

McGonagall's lips twitched. "Far from it, Mister Potter. I should think a strapping young lad such as yourself would have no difficulty at all acquiring a date for the Ball. And, as for the dancing..." here she did smile, making her look years younger. "I'm afraid you're quite on your own."

"You're no help at all." Harry grumbled. "Is there anything else?"

"You're dismissed, Mister Potter." McGonagall still smiled. Just before the door swung shut he heard something that sounded suspiciously like laughter. Such a thing was impossible. Everyone knew that Professor McGonagall didn't laugh. Still, as he made his way back to the common room, he found himself smiling just a little.

After all, if she of all people could see the humor in a situation, he certainly could.

"Hey, Luna."

She smiled up at him. He'd found her out by the lake, feeding pieces of toast to the fish. He dropped down to sit next to her and let his legs swing freely. She tore off another piece and tossed it, a fish snatching it out of the air in a rather dramatic fashion. "Good one!" she praised it, before handing him a piece. "Your turn, Harry. Go on."

He shrugged and threw the piece in, only after watching it be devoured in little, darting jerks remembering why he'd come to find Luna in the first place. And wouldn't you know it? He lost the ability to speak again. Every time he tried he just sort of...squeaked before giving the whole thing up and looking pleadingly at her.

She giggled. Kill him now. "Is there something you wanted to ask me, Harry?"

He nodded. She wrinkled her brow in mock-thought.

"Well, what is it?" she asked, eyes bright and teasing.

Harry swallowed, feeling his ears burn, and choked out, "Wilgobalme?" he slapped his forehead and tried again. "I mean, will you go to the Yule Ball with me, Luna Lovegood?"

Luna threw her head back- he shouldn't have enjoyed the curve of her neck displayed as much as he had- and laughed. He found himself smiling, something about the carefree nature of well...her drawing it out of him despite a deep and possibly lethal dose of embarrassment. "Yes," she said, finally calming down. "I will go to the ball with you, Harry Potter."

"Oh, that's- that's good then." he breathed a sigh of relief and his whole body sagged. "You wouldn't know how to dance, would you?"

"A bit," she sounded confused, yet curious. "why? Do you?"

"Nope." he confessed freely, having reached embarrassment overload a while back. "I was hoping you could teach me."

"What will the papers say?" Luna teased, smile wide and impish. "Harry Potter, The Harry Potter, can't dance."

He huffed. "Will you help me or not?"

"Of course," she said, before standing and extending a hand to him. "In fact, we'll start now."

"Now?" Harry scrambled to his feet. "But there's no music!"

Luna tilted her head at him. "Now why would you think that matters?"

So they danced out by the lake, toast-seeking fish swimming nearby, to no music. Having her in his arms felt...right was the only word he could think of. He didn't know how long they were out there, and he didn't really care. All he focused on was the warmth of Luna in his arms, the smell of her hair, and not stepping on her feet.

His music free practices with Luna carried on through to the end of the month, at which point she judged him good enough to stop entirely. When he asked her, for the third or fourth time, why they were dancing without music, her answer was typical in that it came out of nowhere but made perfect sense.

"Because if we practiced with music, that would be the only music you could dance to." she explained as he spun her out and back in- he'd just discovered the move and liked the way her hair spun out behind her as she twirled. "This way, your body knows how to move, the music just tells it when."

Like he said, typical.

After his lessons he had a bit more confidence about the whole 'dancing in front of a whole bunch of people' thing the Yule Ball had become in his mind. He still fretted about it, occasionally, when it was late or he had a bit of free time. Free time, incidentally, was something he had less and less of as the days went by.

First off, he'd been completely right about Hermione. She'd taken to the task of translating the tablet like a woman possessed. It had become her crusade, leading her to spend hours on end digging through language reference texts in the library at arbitrary hours. Which would have been fine, except she had a bad habit of dragging him and Neville into it.

Secondly, funny things were happening with his magic. It wasn't that it had stopped working or something- in fact he was having the opposite problem. Spells that used to drain him no longer did, and things he could do with only a wave of his hand he could now accomplish with just a thought. Keeping his newly expanded power under control was a headache. He'd never had to watch himself that carefully before.

The third and final thing was both more frightening and more important than the first two. He'd started thinking about who could have entered him into the Tournament. He ruled out all of the students right away, there being no way in hell any of them could get past the enchantments. The power of the thing still resonated in his memory. He ruled out teachers on the basis that they by and large didn't mean him harm.

So that left people on the outside, which actually narrowed the field quite a bit. Logic, and a bit of a fatalist streak, had led him to believe that whoever it was either served or had at one point served Voldemort. They still hadn't caught the remnants of the Azkaban breakout from last year. Any one of them could have done it. So he went to Dumbledore. Hopefully that would help. Or at least make him feel better.

Well, that was...reassuring?

Sometimes he felt like it would be easier to talk to dogs or something than try and have a conversation with Dumbledore. He wouldn't feel so ridiculously outwitted, for one, and the dog would probably be easier to understand. The old wizard didn't mean anything by it, he was pretty sure, but still...

That meeting was a perfect example; He, Harry, had concerns. Dumbledore listened to and acknowledged them, then addressed them. Trouble came with the delivery- he had no idea at all what the headmaster had said. After he started explaining wardtheory something went wrong with Harry's ears; he started hearing bees buzzing instead of words, but the basics of what he understood was as follows;

Each student wears robes as part of the uniform. On all of these robes is the Hogwarts crest. Cast on that crest is a tracking spell that lets the headmaster know where on the grounds everyone was. The spell deactivates for the summer and winter, the point being that the wards wouldn't allow anyone on the grounds without a crest or the express permission of a member of the school staff.

Conclusion: whoever snuck onto the grounds and entered Harry into the Tournament had a Hogwarts robe. It made his earlier thoughts about the students seem idiotic until he remembered that half of England- Voldemort included- had worn a Hogwarts robe at some point in their lives.

The hole had been fixed and now he could rest easy in the knowledge that the only things trying to kill him would have the schools' permission to do so.

So, naturally, he didn't rest easy at all.

Harry was ambling, something he didn't do very often, but the day just was too good to pass up. It was beautiful for a Scottish winter's day; this generally meant a lack of rain, maybe a bit of sun. But, as he made his way around the lake and the wind tugged at the ends of his robes, he decided he was gonna take what he can get.

"Haaarrrryyy!"

He was a good hundred yards from the school, if he turned around he could see most of it without leaning his head back. He didn't though, enjoying the lack of things on his mind and doing his best to ignore whoever it was shouting his name.

"Haarrryy Pooottteeerr!"

No matter how many times they did it. Today was his day off. Nothing important, life-threatening, or dangerous would happen on his day off. It just wouldn't. So when the voice- who sounded suspiciously like Hermione- shouted his name again, he did his best to convince himself that since she wasn't going away he might as well listen. Because it was his day off, and nothing bad was going to happen.

It wouldn't.

Harry sighed and turned, catching the amusing sight of Hermione Granger running flat out across the grounds. It wasn't that she was unfit, it was that whenever she ran her hair turned into this massive, bushy cape that streamed out behind her. So when she caught up to him, panting and sweaty, the fact that he couldn't stop smiling probably didn't help her mood any.

"You..." she panted. "are a thoroughly...despicable...human being!"

His eyebrows rose. "I am?"

Between gasps for air and nursing a stitch in her side she managed to say, "Been chasing you...since lunch...have you got cotton in your ears or something?"

"Eh?"

"Oh, for the love of-!" she threw up her hands. "Never mind! Just- do you want to know why I ran like a madman across the grounds or not?"

Harry perked up. "Yes!"

Hermione crossed her arms and turned up her nose. "Maybe I don't want to tell you, after being ignored for so long."

He rolled his eyes. "Oh, please, you'll explode if you don't tell me...whatever it is you came to tell me."

She held out for as long as she could, but he watched cracks appear in her admittedly impressive demeanor. Her lips twitched, and she gave in moments later and sighed. "Fine, fine. You know me too well, you know that? Anyway, I came to tell you that I figured out the tablet. At least partially."

It...it wasn't bad, per se. It wasn't brilliant, and he wasn't going to write home about it, but he wasn't bleeding, bruised, or on fire so he'd let it slide. That being said, he was incredibly curious what she'd found out, so he held out his arm and said in an exaggeratedly posh accent, "Would you care to escort me then, Miss. Granger?"

"But I just got here!" she pouted, before relenting and taking his arm. "Fine, but only if we have a walk around the lake first."

He wasn't in any particular hurry, so... "Well, that was the plan, so-" he gestured with his free hand. "lead the way."

So, with a smile, she did just that.

The table was scattered with books, papers, and empty inkwells. Parchment with Hermione's neat, elegant writing took up the spaces not occupied by everything else. In short, it looked like she was having an ordinary day. The exception was the large, scuffed stone tablet that took center stage, propped on an altar of other, presumably useless books.

"Hermione," Harry said, taking in the scene. "why exactly didn't you tell me you were doing this? I would have helped, you know. I feel bad not helping."

"Harry," she fixed him with one of her 'you're-an-idiot-and-here's-why' looks. "under normal circumstances I wouldn't help. But under normal circumstances you would have wanted to solve it in the first place. The deck is stacked against you, and anything I can do to even the odds, I will. Even if it means translating a dead language for you on a Saturday."

"I- uh." there was something in his eye, something that needed turning away to remove. Looking back on this moment he would deny his voice sounding like sandpaper. "You said something about a dead language."

"Yeah," she said, before arms wrapped around his middle. "you know we're here for you, right? Anything you need."

"Uh." The entire Gobi desert appeared to have taken up residence in his eyes, requiring a thorough scrubbing to remove. "Oh, bugger it."

Harry turned and damn near squeezed the life out of Hermione. She held onto him for a long moment before pushing him back and saying, "You have something in your eye?"

"No." he sniffed and turned his attention to the table. "So what am I looking at?"

In so doing he missed Hermione's smile and fond look. "It's a riddle," she rooted around for a specific piece of parchment, which she then handed to him. "in Aramaic, if you'll believe it."

"I'll confess to having no idea what that is." he took the parchment and scanned the riddle.

"You know how there are dead languages?"

"Yeah."

"This is an extremely dead language."

"Ah."

The riddle read like this;

Greetings chosen,welcome champion.

Attend the challenge of our words.

Where we live you've seen before,

but often missed for something more.

You will chase us, you will hunt us,

for we've taken that which you will miss.

Ware, champion, you've not all of time.

An hour's search, that's all you have,

past that, it's done, you've failed your task.

And what we've taken will never leave.

Harry blew out a breath and tossed the riddle back onto the table. "They don't mince words, do they? 'What we've taken will never leave'? Not a lot of wiggle room in that."

Hermione frowned. "I don't think they mean literally, Harry, in my mind it's more of warning to take this seriously."

"Hermione, they're saying that they're going to kidnap someone close to me and- unless I can rescue them in an hour- not give them back. Of course I'm taking this seriously."

She chewed that over for a moment. "Why do you think they're taking someone?"

He gave her an annoyed look. "Otherwise I'd bugger off and buy a new one."

"Fair enough." Hermione conceded, before giving the riddle another pass. "At least we know where it'll happen."

"The forest."

She nodded before frowning. "This actually isn't a hard riddle, is it?"

He shrugged. "Pretty sure the challenge was in the translation."

"Fair enough." she conceded. "Has- has Neville said anything about the Ball?"

"Uh..." Harry wrinkled his brow in recollection. "no. At least, I don't think so. Should he have?"

"No," she buried her disappointment quickly enough that he only caught a hint of it. "of course not. Are you ready? I hear the champions have to dance in front of everyone."

"Actually, I think I've got it." he said, to her brief confusion.

"Luna teach you?"

"Yep."

Oh, God.

There's no way I'm going to make it.

Suggestions?

Run! Run away!

"Harry?"

Luna's soft, husky voice drew him nicely from his panic. Then he looked at her, and forgot how to breathe. The sight of Luna's slender form draped in a pale gold dress, her hair braided and hanging down her back reached into his mind and took away everything other than oh, you lucky wanker. He couldn't stop staring and from the way a pink flush traveled from her cheeks to the curve of her shoulders, Luna didn't seem to mind.

"Uh-I-uh..." Harry cleared his throat and tried again. "You look beautiful, Luna."

She smiled, eyes reflecting the chandeliers hanging in the Entrance Hall as she walked up to him. "Thank you. You don't look too bad yourself."

"Oh." he said. He was suddenly worried that his jacket might be wrinkled and set about straightening it before Luna's small hands stopped him. She looked like she was holding back laughter at his expense- which he probably deserved.

"You look fine," she assured him. "Now calm down, you're making my teeth itch."

"Champions over here, please!" McGonagall called. He let Luna drag him over, still trying to figure out if itchy teeth were possible.

The champions assembled made quite a sight. Miss Delacour(he still didn't know her first name) looked typically magnificent, leaving her date looking both shabby and glassy-eyed. Harry doubted he'd been drinking, so it probably had to do something with his date's being a Veela.

Cedric's date was a pretty Asian Ravenclaw who he'd never met but had passed in the hall on several occasions. She looked beyond thrilled to be here, and Harry wondered if she'd mind taking his place in the Tournament. When he got to the surly Durmstrang champion Krum he did a double-take.

"Hermione?"

Hermione Granger, his Hermione Granger, smiled at him from her place on Krum's arm. "Luna! Harry! Hi! Oh, you look so beautiful, Luna!"

From there the girls proceeded to talk about dresses, leaving Harry and Krum out in the dark. This was the girliest he'd ever seen Hermione act. Something else occurred to him; where was Neville? Hadn't he been planning on asking her to the Ball? Before Harry could ask her, the doors swung open, McGonagall said, "It's time.", and his own traitorous feet took him into the Great Hall.

"Harry, if you don't breathe soon, you're going to faint."

Luna, damn her, sounded highly amused. He didn't see the humor. The only funny thing about the last twenty minutes were one of the red headed boys' dress robes. Not for the first time he was glad he'd refused, flat out, to wear them. The poor guy looked like an effeminate priest or something.

At least he got to eat dinner first. He and the other champions were seated at a table next to the one holding the heads of school and various hangers-on. After Dumbledore had stood and said his piece- something about "welcome, welcome, one and all", Harry wasn't really paying attention- the feasting began. The food didn't just appear like it normally did.

He peered at his plate curiously. Were the elves on strike? Could elves go on strike? Luna rapped him on the head with something before handing it to him. "Ow." Oh, so that was how this was supposed to work. "Lamb chops." he said to his plate. Beside him Luna ordered something with fish and they spent their dinner trying to distract him from the fact he was going to have to dance soon.

"Now that we're all fed and watered, the festivities may begin!" Dumbledore declared. "If the champions will proceed to the dance floor, we may begin with the opening dance!"

Make that very soon.

Looking back, he would be hard pressed to tell what music had been playing. He flat out didn't know what sort of dance he was supposed to have done. The only thing he could think about- all he could focus on was her; her happy, bright smile. Her warm, almost hot skin under his palm. The way she would laugh when he spun her out and back.

No, he had no idea what music had been playing. But he forgave himself for that.

After the opening dance Luna took pity on him and told him to go find some drinks. Even though he had no idea where to find them, he set off in a random direction, figuring that he would stumble across them sooner or later. He dodged around people who had mustered up the courage to start dancing and instead of stumbling into drinks, stumbled into Hermione.

"Harry!" She was smiling widely and slightly red-faced. Her date was nowhere in sight. She noticed his looks around and explained, "Viktor's gone to get us some drinks."

"That's what I'm supposed to be doing." he replied, taking a seat next to her. When 'Viktor' got back he'd just ask where the drinks lived and until then wanted to catch up with his friend for a bit. "Actually, about that," he said. "where's Neville? I...sort of thought he was going to ask you."

"Oh, he did." she said, her smile only growing. Harry frowned.

"Unless he turned into a surly Bulgarian when I wasn't looking, I'm missing something."

Hermione laughed. "He didn't. Last night he came down with a bad flu and has to spend tonight in hospital. So when Viktor asked me at the last minute, I said yes." her eyes widened. "You don't think he'll be mad, do you?"

Harry shrugged. "Neville? I don't know. Probably not."

It was then that Krum- he should probably call him Viktor now- arrived with two glasses of what he hoped was punch in hand. It was a remarkable thing, watching the normally dour guy visibly brighten when he saw Hermione.

"I have drinks." he announced. His deep voice and thick accent made him rumble and left Harry deeply envious of a voice like that.

"Thank you, Viktor." Hermione said, taking a glass. Harry leaned across the table to better be heard.

"Where did you find those, anyway?" he asked, drawing Viktor's attention from Hermione. "I've been sent on the same mission by my date."

Viktor pointed across the floor and Harry groaned. "They are across the floor. You will know you are in right place because there will be enormous punch bowl." He grinned, just a little bit, as he said this. Harry grinned right back, thanked him, and stood.

"Got to run, Hermione," he explained to her questioning look. "if I don't show up with drinks soon, I don't know," he shivered theatrically. "she might...hurt me."

As he walked away Viktor asked, "Is Potter in danger from his date?"

"Only of a thorough snogging." Hermione replied.

"Luna, what are we doing? This is a broom closet, we can't-"

"You can't possibly be that stupid, Harry Potter."

"What? Oh..."

He didn't say anything else for a long, long time.

The morning of the second task was cold and brisk. Harry hugged the heavy coat tighter around him and wished he could just warm the air and be done with it. He'd thought about his power and growing too dependent on it and come to the conclusion that he didn't want that. So that was why he was huddling on the forest's edge with the other three, equally cold champions waiting for Ludo to finish blathering.

"...and in first place," the fat, happy man boomed, "is the fourth champion; Harry Potter! That's right, ladies and gentlemen, our surprise competitor is also our strongest so let's hear it for him!"

There was a decent swell of applause. He didn't really care if they set the stadiums on fire in their excitement, the people who he really wanted to be here, the people whose approval actually mattered to him, couldn't be here.

Stupid, stupid anti-Muggle laws, he grumbled to himself, hunching his neck a surprise gust of cold wind. Couldn't they just get on with it? They were wasting daylight and more than that, he hadn't seen Luna all day. Because he was capable of putting two and two together he knew where she was and was anxious to get her out. But there was a problem.

Ludo was still talking. "We have tested their bravery with the first task. In the second, we will test their knowledge and quick thinking ability; these are important qualities to any wizard, and even more so to a Triwizard Champion!"

"That title would be more impressive if anyone could name one." Harry muttered under his breath. Ludo continued.

"In the Forbidden Forest we have hidden from each champion something dear to their hearts. They will have an hour to retrieve it, at the end of which- and if they fail- their treasured possession will never be seen again."

Harry wondered if the crowd knew that their treasured 'possessions' were actually people. Then he wondered if they did know, would they care? It was something he was going to have to think about another time because it looked like they were finally starting. Ludo had turned to the champions, happy blue eyes gleaming, and announced,

"We will begin at the stroke of noon, champions. Are you ready?"

He received a variety of answers, ranging from a spoken word to a grunt to Harry's simple nod. This seemed to be enough for the fat man, who drew a pocket watch from his robes and flipped it open. Silence fell; agonizing, endless silence. Seconds ticked by and he was about to just charge in when Ludo pointed his wand into the sky, let off a sound like a starter's pistol, and shouted, "Begin!"

Harry jumped, covering the distance to the trees in a single leap, then vanished into the forest.

He jogged through the trees. It served the dual purpose of covering ground faster and keeping him warm. He had no idea what to look for or where he was going, so he kept his eyes peeled and his head on a swivel. So it came as something of a surprise when he quite literally tripped over his first clue. He groaned and sat up, rubbing his head.

Ah. That might help.

He never could remember to look down.

What he'd tripped over was a wide, flat piece of stone covered in the same markings as the tablet. Since he was neither fluent in Aramaic nor Hermione, it made no sense to him. What did make sense was the arrow pointing deeper into the woods.

"Well," he said. "that's convenient."

Which meant it was probably a trap. He rose and carried on, following the arrow's direction with spheres of hard amber light in his palms. It may be a trap, and he was going to walk right into it, but that didn't mean he was going in unprepared.

Crazy, not stupid, as Hermione would say.

Harry came to a clearing and fell to his knees. Something split the remaining hairs on his head as he fell, spearing across the open air and embedding itself in the trunk of a tree. After it stopped quivering he got a good look at what had almost killed him. It was a spine, made of what looked like bone, about as long as his arm and half as thick. And as he spun around and rose to his feet, he got a look at what had thrown it. It had the body of a lion, the wings of an eagle, and the tail of a porcupine.

It was a manticore, and it was looking at him like he was Thanksgiving dinner.

At least, until he dropped some trees on it. Then it was just angry at him.

The manticore venting its rage on the trees pinning it to the ground gave him time to come up with some way of incapacitating the thing without killing it. His thought process was interrupted by the monster's tail quivering and sending a quartet of spines his way. The earth rose in response to his will, forming a wall that the spines thudded into.

The beast howled in disappointment. Or rage, it was difficult to tell. Harry held up his hands like a conductor and directed the wall to split in two. Then it rolled forward in a wave until it reached the freed manticore. Just before it hit the winged lion's body, the earth sank into the ground and vanished.

Harry's heart sank. Had it not worked?

Earth exploded out of the ground, crude hands of dirt and rock grasping the beast by head and body and pinning it to the ground. The manticore yowled- whether in pain or in anger he couldn't tell, but it didn't look hurt. It did look pissed off. He didn't know how long the hands would hold it, so he did the sensible thing.

Instead of waiting around to see, Harry booked it.

He heard the sound of footfalls on the ground and ducked behind a tree, wrapping power around his forearms in preparation for his attack. The sound grew closer, bringing with it something that gave Harry pause.

Conversation. Whatever was coming his way, they were talking.

"This is an insult, Firenze! We should not lower ourselves to be the...villains in this theatricality the humans insist on performing!"

"Oh?" Firenze, whoever he was, sounded frustrated. "And what should we do instead? Refuse any contact with the world and claim our inherent superiority?"

"Yes!"

"We've done that! Two centuries we've done that, and look where it's gotten us, Magorian: in a forest not even a tenth the size of our old lands. If we do not change, do not open our eyes, then we will die. Either through fire and spell or the slow decay of time, our race is done unless we change now."

Magorian was silent for a long time. So long, in fact, that Harry began to think that Firenze had gotten the point across. Curiosity was getting the better of him, and he started edging towards the tree trunk's curve to get a better look.

"If we change- if we adapt," Magorian's voice was hoarse. "then what do we become? What becomes of our people if we no longer are our people?"

That was when Harry stuck his head around the corner and froze.

Centaurs.

Crap.

The last ten minutes had proven more intriguing and utterly nerve-wracking than any other in the tournament. Even the basilisk wasn't this bad; it was over quickly, and he could do something. The snake was a threat, a physical threat, that he could fight. But this, surrounded by centaurs in the forest, with Luna's limp body tied to the base of a massive tree?

It was almost too much. And he didn't like the way his heart wrenched at the sight of her still form.

The two centaurs, Firenze and Magorian, had found him not long after their argument and brought him to one of their encampments. 'Encampment' wasn't the world they'd used, Harry couldn't say the word they'd used; it sounded like souhkh. It was a massive clearing in the forest, at the center of which stood the tree. Centaurs- all male, and all armed, stood around with bows drawn.

Where are the others? He looked slowly around, fighting the urge to wrap himself in sheets of power. Why am I the only one here?

"Greetings, champion." the voice was old and dry, and came from behind a knot of three impressively large centaurs. As he approached they parted, admitting an old gray horse-man. He had hunched shoulders and a long, scraggly beard, and his eyes were dark and tired. "You are the first to reach your goal. This is unfortunate for you."

"Why?" Harry's golden eyes flashed as his anxiety flared. "Are you going to attack me?"

The old centaur laughed; a sound like a deer's antlers rattling. "No, champion, we are neither foolish nor blind. We can see the star that shines in your heart. We mean you and yours no harm. It is unfortunate because I will challenge all who follow to answer a question. A single question, and if they answer- if they can answer, I will release their hostage to them."

"And my question is unfortunate?" Harry frowned. "I don't understand."

Old Gray lowered himself to the ground, gesturing for Harry to do the same. Still frowning, he lowered himself to the ground and crossed his legs. The old centaur took a long breath. "It is unfortunate because for everyone else, their questions have answers."

He got a sinking feeling in his gut; a premonition of sorts. "And mine doesn't."

Old Gray nodded. "That is what I fear."

Harry swallowed and tried to convince himself of the truth of what he was about to say, "Ask me the question. I am not afraid."

"Very well, brave one. Here is your question." The centaur's dark, tired eyes fixed his and froze him in place. "You have fated eyes, and the star in your heart. But you have wondered at it's purpose."

He had been afraid of this. The one question he'd never been able to answer. The old, well healed wound.

Old Gray asked, "Why do you have your power?"

Harry and Luna left the woods a full ten minutes after the deadline. Funnily enough, he didn't care. He couldn't care less. He held her hand a little bit tighter as they walked towards the tent and the stands. No one had spoken. Not a word had been said.

"What's going on?" Luna was still a little groggy from the enchanted sleep. Harry had offered to heal her of it, but she'd refused, wanting him to save his strength in case they stumbled across any beasties in the woods. He needn't have; their walk back was danger-free.

"I don't know." he replied. He searched out Dumbledore's face and saw such fierce pride that his heart skipped a beat. Hermione's eyes were wide and shining, and she had Neville's arms wrapped around her middle.

He couldn't say what the rest of the school's faces were, because at that moment the strangest thing happened. Madame Maxime, the headmistress of one of his competitors schools, rose to her feet and held her wand in the air.

Two pieces of ribbon shot out; one bent in on itself, the other hanging vertically in the air.

One by one the other judges delivered their final verdicts. He would later find out that even with the score he'd received, the Tournament's officials would deduct ten points for his lateness. He truly did not care. Nothing could touch him now. And it was for the damnedest reason.

It wasn't because of Luna, though he was very aware of her at his side.

It wasn't because he was winning. He wasn't.

It wasn't because he'd triumphed over some monstrous evil.

The plain and simple truth of it was, he was untouchable in this moment because he finally, finally, knew why.

And that, nothing could take away from him.

END CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Note: Some of you may have noticed the increased delay in story updating. Short of it is; I'm back at school, which means I have many, many more demands on my time than I used to.

Also, bits of this chapter were a bitch to write.

And on that note...

GV out.