I know it's not my style to swear in my author's notes, but I am truly mind-fucked.
Seriously, this chapter gave me such a headache because before I wrote this chapter I had absolutely no idea how Draco was going to do this task. Up till now I've been telling myself that I'll worry about it when I get to it. Then when I finally got to it I spent days staring at a blank screen confused. In the end I pulled this out of my arse and I hope it's ok.
By the way, why am I an idiot who says the crappiest things when I panic? I said the stupidest thing to a friend of mine and now I keep banding my head on the table whenever I think about it in humiliation. I'm so stupid!
I don't own Harry Potter.
CHAPTER TWENTY ONE
The Second Task
"My vision, so misleading
Me believing
In things I never saw
Deep inside
When I right now
Things got different
Oh it's not what we thought, no "—Going Under, K. Michelle
At least it wasn't a downright 'No'.
Draco lay on his back staring at the ceiling of his four-poster bed listlessly as he replayed the earlier conversation which had gone better then he'd actually ever hoped. She hadn't said no, she admitted that there may be feelings for him somewhere in her and he'd gotten away with the last word and a kiss.
His head felt all light and buzzy, it was the strangest experience, like holding your head underwater as lack of oxygen makes your heart beat faster and faster, but out of pure determination you refuse to go up for air because being underwater was too much fun. Yup, that summed his feelings up nicely. He was stuck between feeling elated and exasperated, because while it hadn't been a 'No' it wasn't a 'Yes' either and he couldn't help but feel a little disappointed.
Still…
He sat up grinning; it wasn't a 'No'. There was a chance Hermione might feel something for him.
He looked down at his hands and clenched them.
He kissed her, he kissed her on the lips and she didn't scream, shy away or slap him. She was even blushing. That soft pale cream skin of hers dusted lightly red, it was the cutest thing he'd ever seen, he'd thought his heart would burst, it took everything he had not to slam his lips on hers to taste her properly. His Hermione.
Suddenly he felt the bed dip down and looked to see Theo had tossed the egg over and it had narrowly missed his foot. The egg was solid gold. "Hey!" he exclaimed.
"Did you take a bath with it?" Theo answered monotonously, ignoring Draco's irritancy as he straddled the chair from the nearby desk.
It had been a stroke of pure genius actually, it happened a little after the Yule Ball. Draco had just been tossing the egg up in the air absentmindedly when his fingernail hit the top curved tip part painfully. After a minute's worth of swearing he looked at the clasp more closely and noticed it was an eleven pointed starfish and something niggled at the back of his mind. So he looked it up at the library and realised he'd seen it before in that atrocious book of monsters from last year. It was a Mer-dweller starfish; it got its name from living on the walls of Mer-houses underwater and had learned their weird language that could only be heard underwater. And then it hit him, what if the wailing could only be heard underwater too. When mermaids came up top, they sounded a little like that too. Not as painful, but similar.
When he told his theory to Theo, he agreed it was a valid theory. Draco had been planning to sneak into the Room of Requirement, but between all the crap with Hermione recently and animagus meditation and letters from his father reminding him to 'uphold the family honour', it kept slipping his mind. He looked away. "Uhhh…"
Theo sighed. "That's it, we go tomorrow. We need to hear the egg's clue, January's almost up, we don't have much time and I think Krum and Delacour's got it figured out already. They've stopped carrying the egg around, now they're more focused on charms and transfiguration."
"Alright already, we go tomorrow."
Tomorrow came and the two Slytherins readied themselves. They'd have to go at night; no one was allowed to know that they knew about the room. Draco already suspected Dumbledore knew by the way he had side-glanced at him during the Yule Ball when he described the room with the thousands of chamber pots.
"Ready?" Theo asked.
Draco pulled out his wand; out of the two of them he was the best at disillusion spells. "Ready," and tapped their heads while muttering the charm. A cold thrill dripped down his spine like a shock of ice water from the shower as he watched Theo begin to disappear into the background.
Sneaking out of the Slytherin common room was easy enough, picking the right staircases before they moved was the hard part since they enjoyed changing the most when lone students were walking up the steps. Theo reckoned they liked seeing everyone trip and fall.
They were almost there when Draco felt an uncomfortable familiar feeling spike in his chest, it was one of those weird feelings again that were usually followed by something uneventful or an image. "Hold on," he whispered, grabbing Theo's arm as they pressed to the wall. A small clunking sound echoed the hall and then Moody appeared from one of the rooms right beside where they were standing. Just what Draco needed.
Moody closed the door and took a swig from his hip flask. They were too close, just one sound and that magical eye would home in on them and no disillusion charm would be enough. Draco was sure if it was Potter sneaking about Moody would be more than happy to pretend he didn't see anything, but Draco and Moody didn't exactly see eye to eye.
He was so close now as he turned. In his mind, Draco chanted, 'go left, go left, go left, GO LEFT!'
Moody took a step right and Draco unconsciously stepped back. Moody went still, it's over.
But then he huffed and walked left, clunking down the hallway and turning down another corner. When they could no longer hear him the two boys let out a huge sigh of relief. "I thought he saw us for a moment," Theo admitted "Lucky he went left."
Draco wasn't so sure.
The rest of the trip was uneventful except for Mrs Norris, but after dealing with Moody avoiding a cat felt like nothing.
They stood outside the room and thought 'we need a room with a pool or a bath, deep enough to go underwater and soundproof' in case his theory was wrong. He didn't want to alert the whole hallway.
The door melted into place and what awaited them was the Head Boy's bathroom.
Well; good enough.
They had worn swim trunks under their clothes and he stripped down. It was then that Draco caught himself in the mirror and stared. Where the hell had those muscles come from? He used to be so thin and weak. He poked his biceps and it was felt firm-ish. Whoa.
Oh yeah, training for a dragon did that to you. He was still a thin, tall fourteen year old, only one with a little more muscle than most.
He looked at Theo and realised the other boy was still dressed. "Well?" Draco asked.
Theo frowned and looked at the water before shaking his head with an uncomfortable expression. "I…I've changed my mind. I'll stay here."
"You can't, you need to hear the clue with me. The starfish is a creature more commonly found in France, I can't speak French."
Theo looked really perplexed and Draco didn't get it. "Don't tell me you're shy, seriously? What, no confidence, it's not like you're going in naked…"
"It's not that!" Theo snapped with more emotion than usual. Then he sighed. "Fine" and began to strip too.
Draco shrugged and turned to the bath which had filled itself with bubbles. He got in and it was warm, just right, probably a self-adjusting temperature charm. He reached over for the egg just as Theo got in. Draco held the egg tight so it wouldn't slip from the soap. He seriously hoped he was right, because if he wasn't, his ears were in for a world of hurt.
They nodded, took in a deep breath and ducked underwater just as Draco undid the clasp.
He braced himself for screeching but instead the softest, most beautiful, eerie soprano filled his ears and chilled his spine in the warm water. It was so clear and crisp he couldn't believe he was hearing this underwater.
"Come seek us where our voices sound,
We cannot sing above the ground,
And while you're searching, ponder this:
We've taken what you'll sorely miss,
An hour long you'll have to look,
And to recover what we took,
But past an hour- the prospect's black,
Too late, it's gone, it won't come back"
That was all they could stand as they surged up for air, red in the face from heat and panting. When they had calmed Theo exclaimed, "This is it, you did it, Draco! It is an underwater song."
Draco grinned as he pushed back some white blond hair that had stuck to his eyelids. In his four years at Hogwarts he'd done a lot of amazing things, but most of those things were influenced by dreams and feelings and mysterious black outs. He knew it was technically 'him' doing all those things even if something else had given him the idea to do it, but still, it was nice to accomplish something completely on his own without any weirdness involved.
"Yeah," he said. "And I'm pretty sure the thing who 'cannot sing above the ground' is a mermaid. But the rest of it, I need to hear it again," and it was back underwater for them. When they resurfaced again Theo was a bit more sombre. "We've taken what you'll sorely miss?"
"Too late, it's gone, it won't come back?" Draco repeated. "How are the mermaids supposed to take something from me when they have no legs."
"Don't be stupid, they won't be directly taking anything from you, I'll bet it'll be the teachers who do it. What I'm more concerned about is the 'hour long you'll have to look' part. I think the teachers'll hide whatever they take amongst the mermaid's lair and the test is figuring out a way to breathe underwater and retrieve it."
"And if I don't find it, it disappears? I wonder what they'll take, my wand?"
"Nah, you'll need it for the task, it'll be something else. For now let's see if we can find ways for you to breathe underwater for an hour without dying."
They sat in the bath for a while longer before Draco stretched. "Come on, it's getting late and taking a bath with another guy has gone beyond weird, even if the bath is as big as the ocean."
"Agreed," Theo nodded as Draco got out. Unsurprisingly, towels magically seemed to appear nearby. Draco picked one up to dry his hair.
So the task meant that he'd have to deal with mermaids? Draco had mixed feelings about this. And an hour underwater, how the hell was he supposed to do that?
He turned back. "Hey Theo…" and stopped.
He wasn't staring because of anything weird; it was a completely natural reaction to stare even as Theo was turned away from him as he towel dried his ebony hair. Because Theo's back was criss-crossed with an abundance of deep ugly scars.
Draco blinked. They stood out against Theo's pale white, almost translucent skin. Some were carved so deeply they looked like cracks on dry earth and some so light they were like pencil marks. Theo turned and Draco blinked again. Even though Draco had observed that he had become quite muscled in the past few months, it didn't compare to Theo. No one would have ever thought since he always looked so lanky in his Slytherin robes, and the guy didn't do anything remotely physical. But that wasn't what Draco was looking at; it was all the scars on Theo's chest too. Now that he was thinking about it, Draco had never seen Theo change in front of him; he always went to the bathroom or changed before Draco was awake.
Theo noticed Draco looking and stopped still. He frowned and gave a look that clearly demanded not to ask. They were silent for a moment before Theo dried himself, wiping the black towel over the scarred white skin and shrugging on his school shirt. "Are you going to get dressed before morning?" he said calmly.
Draco sighed and continued dressing. It wasn't any of his doing. If Theo didn't want to say anything, that was his business.
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"Maybe if I'm lucky, my animagus form will be something with gills." Draco said bored as he slammed another useless book shut.
It had been two weeks since they'd figured out the clue. Now they were searching for methods of breathing underwater with no results. Draco barely saw any of Hermione as she found the same problem in relevance to Potter. He pouted, giving her that clue was supposed to free up her time, not make her more obsessed.
Theo closed another book. "Don't wish for something so stupid. If it is something with gills, you'll have to sleep in a fishbowl every night to escape the nightmares, and other than the tournament when else will you need to breath underwater for long periods of time?" he said this all monotonously.
Since the discovery of Theo's scars neither of them broached the subject. Theo seemed thankful for some strange reason, but for Draco it was only natural. After putting up with half a year of withholding the truth about his dreams, Draco understood about secrets you couldn't tell anyone. He owed Theo this much.
"How are the nightmares?" Theo asked.
Draco shrugged. "Actually, I haven't been getting them much these days. Maybe it's the stress, but while I'm not getting them so often, they are becoming clearer. Before it was only shadowy images, then the voices and colours became clearer, then I could pick up details, now I'm seeing the whole picture. I think I've seen more dead bodies in the past two years than a mortician."
Theo frowned. "I looked everywhere, but there's nothing that's similar to the symptoms you described to me. I'm wondering if we should seek further advice on this…"
"No way, it was hard enough telling you, I don't want some medi-wizard poking around my head," Draco said determinedly.
Theo only shrugged. "I was thinking more along the lines of Professor Snape, or in an extreme case, Dumbledore."
"Are you crazy?!" Draco exclaimed and earned an evil glare from a librarian.
"Out of all the most interfering Gryffindors he's the king of the lot. And Snape? Yeah, right! That's as good as telling my father. I tell Snape I'm hearing voices and where will that land me, right into St. Mungo's. And I'm not crazy."
"It's been said that it is the crazy people who are firm about the idea that they are not crazy," Theo commented blandly and Draco glared.
"Let's just focus on Animagus training and this underwater thing. You sure you don't want to try too?"
When Draco had received the potion from Hermione he had offered some to Theo but the dark haired boy refused. He felt he was perfectly happy in his human from. Draco reckoned he just didn't want the possibility of turning into something disgusting like the flobberworms.
"No," Theo affirmed. "I do not."
Draco laughed and opened another book.
Theo stretched and got up. "I'm going to sleep, you coming?"
"Nah, I'll stay a little longer, champions get special privileges. I think I've done more research for this task than I've done for anything else all year, I hope this stiff comes up in our OWLS."
When Theo was gone Draco pulled out of his chair and walked to the bookcase to slip the tome amongst its brethren. This was getting him nowhere. He sighed and slumped down on the floor, resting against the bookcase. He only had five days left. If he didn't figure out a way to breath underwater he was doomed.
Maybe he should ask Hermione?
No. He slammed his foot down on that idea immediately. He couldn't keep relying on her when things got difficult, he was the man, it was supposed to be the other way round. If he didn't solve this himself he'd never be able to prove how dependable he was and get out of the friend zone.
This was getting complicated fast. Perhaps instead of searching aimlessly through books, he should focus on specific subjects.
Transfiguration? No, it was his worse subject. Herbology, Professor Sprout hated him. Charms? Were there any charms for breathing underwater?
Potions?
Actually, the idea had merit. Draco had already searched a few potion texts and came up with nothing, but it wasn't forbidden to seek advice from a more knowledgeable source. Theo was wrong about going to Snape about the dreams, but there wasn't anything wrong about enquiring about potions. While asking for help was not an idea that appealed to him, Draco realised he didn't really have a choice.
Besides, he had no other options. What did he have to lose?
It was easier said than done though, now that he was standing outside Snape's office. Draco hesitated. Was this cheating? What did he care? Slytherins do anything to reach their goals. And he entered.
The rooms were empty and Draco felt a little stupid for being so nervous over nothing. He was about to leave when he heard the voice of his professor call out, "Mr Malfoy?"
He turned to see Snape at a desk marking papers with a grim expression. "It's late, why are you not in the common room?"
"I appealed for a longer curfew, to research for the task."
"Ah," Snape nodded.
Since Draco's name came from the goblet Snape had neither congratulated him nor rebuked him for it. At the time it hadn't mattered much, but now Draco was thinking about it he found himself curious. "Uh, Professor, I wondered if I might ask your advice?"
Snape did not look up, nor did he stop marking but Draco knew he was listening.
Draco took a breath and went for it. "I was wondering if you had ever come across potions that pertain to breathing underwater."
"Does this by chance, have anything to do with the second task?" Snape finally asked.
Draco adopted the same careless persona he used whenever he was bargaining in the truest Slytherin fashion. "It has to do with an interest I have with staying underwater for an hour," he answered.
Snape finished one paper and took another from the pile. "I see. Because the rules imply I cannot offer any direct assistance to a champion for a task. This is a competition, Mr Malfoy; remember that the next time you decide to enter something so hazardous."
Draco glowered. "I didn't enter this competition Professor, and if that is all you have to say, then I'll be on my way."
He turned to leave and as soon he put a hand on the door knob he heard Snape said in his quiet tone. "Be very aware of yourself Mr Malfoy, I'm sure there are many who want Mr Potter to come out victorious in this competition and will have no problem eliminating any…obstacles."
Draco nodded, Theo had suggested the same thing, and he knew it since Potter was everyone's 'Golden Boy'.
"By the way," Snape continued, "I've have heard that 'Senor Guanili's Index of Mobile Potions' is a most invigorating read."
Draco nodded as he left.
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This was it, this was it! Draco grinned excitedly as he resisted the urge to jump up and down in an extremely out of character manner though he was hidden at the back of the library during a free period, or to be precise, during a Divination lesson.
Getting the book had been easy enough. Draco had just sent a letter to his father and requested it. Since it had nothing to do with the dreams it was ok and in half a day he received an owl with a first edition copy. As Theo was for some reason, nowhere to be seen, Draco had to peruse the copy on his own.
While he wasn't the bookworm Theo was, he still found it.
In the middle of the book under Aqua-based potions was the most amazing thing he'd ever seen.
The theory was that since the body was made up of mainly water the potion drew out the oxygen from the surrounding water and directed it into the lungs. While doing this it transfigured the rest of the body into a water like substance. The potion was best when made soon and best of all it only took a day to make and though it required great concentration to maintain that state while in usage, thanks to all the meditation sessions due to his animagus training, Draco had a fair amount of confidence in his focus abilities. Like the animagus potion, the tricky part was the ingredients but Draco had already sent a list to his father and was expecting them soon.
He closed the book and got up, the first few steps of the potion didn't require anything difficult, he was sure the school had them and so he decided to get a head start now so the potion would be ready for the more difficult ingredients.
Just as he was turning a corner, Hermione turned it as well. The two of them saw each other and stopped, as a feeling of awkwardness filled them both. But to Draco's delight, he saw Hermione's cheeks redden and she looked away discretely to try to hide it. Good, that meant she hadn't forgotten.
She blushed and Draco grinned. "Hey, I haven't seen you in a while," he said and when she blushed deeper he felt like teasing her a bit.
"H-hey," she said quietly. That wasn't the Hermione he knew and loved.
His grin became cat-like as he took three brisk steps till he was standing almost before her. "You know, you should quit it with the awkwardness."
"I'm not being awkward," she said with a little more strength as she dipped her chin a little.
"I wouldn't be, because nothing changed between us. I want things to stay the same, even when you finally realise your undying love for me, things will be the same," he raised her chin so their eyes met, "only better."
If she was blushing a second ago, she went completely crimson now. Who knew his Hermione could blush this deeply? She never did that with any of the other people she crushed on, his luck was looking up.
She finally decided she couldn't take it anymore and pushed away but Draco realised it was a half-hearted push, so he let go, feeling victorious.
"Thank you for the clue," she said finally. "Even though Harry kept saying he had figured it out already, I noticed he was lying. He's no good at these things, even when he found Nicolas Flamel that one time it was by accident." She smiled "The way you figured it out was genius, I'm really impressed. You're usually so lazy."
He laced his hands behind his head and leaned into them as he looked away. "Maybe I had someone I was trying to impress."
She went red again; who knew flirting openly was so much fun.
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It was starting again. Two figures Apparated into a desolate area. They were confused as they had been told this would be the area for the next raid.
The figure with the dark black hair looked around the area in confusion, it seemed the raid had already begun, houses were empty and dead, everything had an air of dark magic.
"Are you sure it's the right place?" the blond figure of Draco's regular dreams said quietly.
"Dawkin's Patronus came yesterday; it only said to be here. Do you doubt me?" the black haired man answered. His voice was cold and monotonous, but at the same time it was eerily familiar, like he had heard this voice regularly.
Come to think of it, for some reason he also recognised the blond man's voice too. Both were very familiar. How, as this wasn't his first time seeing the dark haired man in his dreams. He was a close friend of the other guy. They were like brothers almost, always getting each other out of scraps and to safety. But why was it only now that Draco felt a pang of familiarity in the back of his mind?
They drew their wands and proceeded with caution. Suddenly from the corner of his eye came a flash of green light. The blond haired man shoved the dark haired one out of the way.
Hordes of Order members filed in, it was a trap.
But Death Eaters wouldn't be so easily fooled. The man put his wand to his lips and whispered, "Ascondes," the spell that acted as a communication device though wands. "It's time," and with that thousands of death eaters began apparating in for another all-out battle.
The two ducked killing curses and stunning hexes. Sixteen, seventeen, eighteen, he began counting the ones he killed. It made it easier to treat it as a game.
In the corner of his eye a flash of brown made him stop.
That brown could have been anything but he knew it was her. She fought magnificently, what did you expect from the brightest witch of the century? When you saw things like that it made you wonder what you were fighting for. If her blood was so impure, why could she do these things?
He saw a flash of green too close to her and reacted without thinking
"Rictorius!" he called and a blast sent her flying out of the way of a killing curse.
She looked up and wiped the blood from her face. She looked at him and though she'd never know it, his entire body went numb when those brown eyes found his.
"You!" she screamed and then he realised he wasn't wearing his Death Eater mask.
"You bastard!" and she attacked.
It was so hard, she was a seasoned fighter and very handy with a wand, but he was better and stronger so he should have had the upper hand, but every attack was spent desperately trying not to hurt her. Every curse from her mouth was so painful. He felt so pathetic; this was a battle, it was neither the time nor place to be concerned with such a thing. Even so, his heart wasn't listening to reason.
Another blast and the air suddenly went cold; he knew what was happening. He was joining the fight.
Another killing curse headed towards him, there was no spell that could deflect it without announcing to everyone watching that he was trying to protect her. So he did the only natural thing and punched her. She went down and he dodged. He felt disgusting, hitting her.
Again, she spat out blood and looked at him with hate filled eyes that wrenched at his soul, it hurt more to have her see him than it did to have her not.
"Get away from her!"
Ah, here comes the red haired moron. The man raised his wand as the red haired man cried out a killing curse and the blond man didn't have time to get out of the way.
"Move it!" cried the dark haired man as he went barrelling into his friend's side, knocking him out of the way.
"Thanks," he spat quickly.
His friend only nodded.
Then the air went cold and he appeared.
A disgusting figure swamped in robes of pure black; his skin was a sickly pale, translucent green, like the skin of a venomous snake. It matched his bald head, slit nose and crimson eyes. It was a monster, it was disgusting, and it was the master he served.
"Voldemort's come, retreat!" called the red haired man and he and the girl the blond man loved Apparated away just in time.
"The Dark Lord actually showed up" the friend said, confused.
"But why were we not informed of this and why were we told to go in ahead of time?" he questioned as the battle quickly turned into a complete massacre of those Order members who couldn't get away in time.
"There are many in the ranks who want us dead, maybe they hoped we'd get ousted by the Order members."
The blond haired man said nothing, his mind on the girl who Apparated away, besides he knew his friend was right; pushing her hate filled gaze away from his mind he clapped his friend's shoulder. "Come on, we're not needed here anymore."
They Apparated away, to a Manor that looked strangely familiar.
As they panted, the blond haired man nodded to his companion. "Oh, thanks by the way. I think that's forty-seven times now that you've saved me."
The dark haired man grinned grimly. "Just paying you back for the fifty-five times you've saved my neck out there."
Draco shot up in bed and grasped his head, panting. Quickly, he desperately tried to conjure images or faces from the dream. He always remembered what happened, but never much of anything else. He could see the stands of brown hair on the girl's head, the smell of burning flesh of the dying, the sound of screaming as curses whizzed through the air, but never the faces of the deceased or the killers, nor the man himself.
It had been weeks since his last dream but this one had more content - that dark malicious figure oozing magical power had only appeared from the shadows in his dreams. This was becoming too much for him to take and Theo had now been gone for three days. Usually, Theo would often be gone for days before suddenly appearing again and normally Draco wouldn't care, except he had thought Theo would be there to nag him before the second task. To disappear before something like this wasn't something Theo often did.
Draco brushed away the thought as he got up. It wasn't quite morning yet but he knew there was no point in trying to sleep anymore. So he sat himself on the bed for more animagus meditation. Lately, Draco felt as if he was actually getting somewhere with this, when he meditated he felt like there was an image trying to come through, through the darkness of his closed eyes. But unlike other visions, whenever he tried to grasp this it always slipped away. But he felt he was almost there. Not bad considering it had only taken him four months to get this way.
Morning came and it was the day of the second task. All he wanted was to crawl back into bed and sleep, his eyes were drooping and every time he breathed, a yawn threatened to break though. He couldn't even take any pepper-up potion because it would mix with the potion he'd have to take later.
He pulled himself to the great hall only to find Theo still missing. Strange? While he tried to force some food into his mouth and down his throat despite his protesting stomach he looked across to the Gryffindor table and found that Potter, Weasley and Hermione weren't there either.
Even when they'd finally arrived at the great lake where the test was taking place, neither Hermione nor Theo had bothered to show up and Draco was feeling a bit miffed. But he'd worry about that later. They had to wait a bit for Potter to decide to show up.
When he finally did they all stood at the pier in swim shorts or in Delacour's case, a swimsuit. In the back of Draco's mind, he heard Bagman doing the announcement and he brought out the potion, it took a little preparation first before he could drink it and began to chant the spell quietly under his breath.
A shot went off signalling the beginning of the task.
Draco watched as the Durmstrang and Beauxbatons champions dived into the icy water. Now that he was finished chanting he had to swill the flask twice clockwise and three times counter-clockwise before it was ready. Potter walked into the water without even drawing his wand, he stuffed something into his mouth and everyone, particularly Slytherins laughed. Draco would have at least sneered but he was too focused on his potion, when it was finally ready, Potter had disappeared under water. It seemed he was the last to go as he threw the bottle back and swallowed everything in one gulp before diving headfirst into the icy water.
It was like fire, forget water, he was on bloody fire, whose great idea was it to have the second test underwater on a Scottish February?
But very quickly he felt the cold ebb away; in fact, he felt most his body begin to ebb away. When Draco looked down his skin had become translucent, everything, organs included, was a see-though blue hue. He took a deep breath and found to his satisfaction that he could breathe. He felt a little lightheaded, but kept calm in order to maintain the potion's effects.
Manipulating the water currents and his body, he forced himself down to the lake's floor. If it were mermaids, then they were down there. Once down, he spotted a nest of grindylows. They spotted him but Draco pulled out his wand and muttered a stunning hex and they scattered. Then he said clearly, "Point me," and his wand spun sluggishly in the water and stopped left. He followed it and found it did not change its direction from the left. He was making excellent time; he'd definitely get there before Potter.
But then something happened; his head started hurting, building up behind his eyes in a familiar sensation. Another bloody vision headache!
He stopped and clutched his head, desperately trying not to let go of the spell. If he did even once it would stop working and he was too far down underwater to return to the surface in time. He let out a scream that escaped in a torrent of bubbles.
Something was threatening to break through; in the back of his mind he could hear the mermaid's song.
"An hour long you'll have to look,
And to recover what we took..."
He screamed.
He didn't have time for this, why was this taking so long! Then something was breaking though, unlike short flashes and visions, Draco began to see a full picture and for the first time he remembered a part of his dream clearly.
A disgusting figure swamped in robes of pure black; his skin was a sickly pale, translucent green, like the skin of a venomous snake. It matched his bald head, slit nose and crimson eyes. It was a monster, it was disgusting, and it was the master he served.
"Voldemort's come, retreat!" called the red haired man and he and the girl the blond man loved Apparated away just in time.
And it broke away, leaving Draco struggling with all he had to hold himself together.
Voldemort? The Dark Lord? How could he be in the vision, Voldemort was dead!
"...your time's half gone, so tarry not,
Lest what you seek stays here to rot..."
Pushing that thought away Draco felt his headache began to slip away. He was running out of time.
Regaining control over the spell he surged forward and was met with another shock.
Hermione! Theo!
The two most important people in his life were floating lifelessly while tied to the floor of the mermaid's lair. At first a panic and desperation filled him, they looked dead, until he realised a series of bubbles kept appearing by their mouths. They were breathing.
"And while you're searching, ponder this:
We've taken what you'll sorely miss,"
They took important people; well at least that explained where Theo had been all this time. Whoa, he was going to be so pissed when he realised he'd spent who knows how long floating amongst the slimy ugly mermaids he hated.
The common misconception of many was that all mermaids were beautiful, but that was a lie. Truthfully many mermaids were actually very ugly; it was sirens who were beautiful.
He realised they weren't the only ones floating, Weasley was also held in stasis. Theo must be his hostage, Weasley, Potter's and Hermione was Krum's. Fleur must have already been and taken her hostage.
Draco growled, like he'd let Krum save his Hermione. But then he realised Potter was already here, shit.
Draco pulled out his wand, he realised Potter was trying to cut Weasley out with a rock. Pathetic. But then, Potter had somehow transfigured himself into a weird fish creature who couldn't speak underwater. Draco's potion allowed for speech. He went for Theo first and muttered a slicing hex that made quick work of the ropes. He would have left already, but he waited for the same reason Potter was, he wasn't going anywhere until Hermione was rescued.
Potter looked at him curiously and right now Draco didn't give a damn if he suspected anything, where the hell was Krum?
It seemed Potter lost patience at the same time he did as he tried to cut Hermione free. But one of the mermaids came and slapped the rock from his hands, screaming that they could only rescue their own hostage.
Potter tried to retrieve the rock but the mermaids stopped him. No fucking way was Hermione going to stay here past the hour limit.
He pulled out his wand and cast a freezing charm as the first round of mermaids became frozen solid. He swam before the hostages and held out his wand. "Leave, or next time you'll be short of one Mer." They screeched and swam away.
Draco turned to see Potter staring at him incredulously. Draco managed his best condescending smirk as he cast a slicing hex. He saw Potter try to defend Hermione but the spell missed them both and went for the rope holding her.
Before Potter could do anything, he grabbed Theo and forced himself up, damning himself for being unable to do anything more.
Wow, that ended up being a super long chapter. I wanted to finish each book with long chapters so I could finish this story quickly, but since so many things happened in this book that is relevant to my story, it ended up much longer than I though. Anyway, this isn't a barter for reviews but I spent a long time on this. So guys, it'd be great to get to 500 reviews.
I'll still write, this isn't a barter but I know a hell of a lot of people are reading this, so can you all review… please?