Santa Paws
by Teddylonglong
Please refer to the disclaimer and warnings in chapter 1.
In case you have not read yesterday's chapter yet, please go back and read chapter 26 first :)
The lake felt almost warm compared to the icy lake on the North Pole, in which he had practised to swim as fast as possible during the last couple of weeks, and Harry arrived in the merpeople's village fairly soon. The basilisk remained next to him the whole time, causing the smaller animals that inhabited the lake as well as the merpeople themselves to remain at a distance.
Quickly assessing the four hostages, Harry wandlessly cast an invisibility spell as well as a notice-me-not charm at Trelawney, knowing that she could only be Dumbledore's hostage. Ignoring the two older girls, he headed straight to the youngest girl, assuming that she had to be Fleur's younger sister, noticing that Cedric, Viktor and Dumbledore just arrived almost at the same time. It only took a moment to free the girl, and he quickly left the merpeople's village. He swiftly made his way back to Hogwarts, still under Amaterasu's close watch.
'She's not only protecting me, but everyone else, too, so that's not exactly cheating,' he thought in amusement, knowing that what he was doing was more than just a small cheat.
As soon as he was back on the shore, glad that Fleur's mother decided to fuss over her younger daughter instead of him, he telepathically asked Dobby to cast a wetting charm at Fleur, who was waiting for him in her swim suit, and bring her out.
'They're leaving now,' Santa Paws informed him, and Harry quickly made himself invisible, just when an invisible Dobby arrived with Fleur right next to him.
Casting a wandless drying charm at himself, Harry quickly returned to the founders' quarters to wait for the Polyjuice potion to wear off.
To his great relief, Dumbledore only arrived on the shore more than ten minutes later than Cedric and Viktor – just a moment outside the time frame of the task.
"Did you do something to Dumbledore?" Luna enquired, giving him a surprised look.
"Not exactly to him," Harry replied, grinning, and admitted what spells he had cast at Trelawney. "Apparently, he had trouble finding her," he added, glad when the Polyjuice potion finally wore off.
Fleur received 50 points for the task, Cedric 45, Viktor 40 and Dumbledore only 25, as he had brought his hostage back, however, only arrived on the shore two minutes after the one-hour time frame was up.
HP
"Who decided who was going to be the hostages?" Harry enquired, once the extended family was sitting together in the founders' quarters that night.
McGonagall let out a deep sigh. "That were Crouch and Bagman. They didn't even want to listen to me, when I told them to not use the young Veela girl as a hostage. I'm surprised that Ms. Delacour did so well in fact. Veelas are known for their affinity for fire. They are not water people at all, and it wouldn't have surprised me if the merpeople had attacked them."
Harry grinned.
"I noticed that the basilisk accompanied Ms. Delacour the whole time," Severus spoke up, teasingly.
"She accompanied all the champions to help them against grindylows and such," Harry replied in a firm voice. "She's a great familiar."
"Did you ask her to do that?" McGonagall enquired in apparent surprise.
"Yes," Harry replied, simply, wondering if he should tell them how much he had been involved in the second task, however, decided against it. 'McGonagall is the headmistress after all. It's better if she doesn't know about it. Perhaps I'll tell her and Professor Sprout during the summer holidays, when the Triwizard Tournament is long over,' he resolved.
HP
The much dreaded Quidditch match versus Durmstrang took place at the beginning of May in blazing sunshine. Harry feverishly looked for the Snitch, completely ignoring the match below him. 'The score doesn't matter anyway, as we're 240 points in the lead,' he thought, concentrating on the task ahead.
In the eleventh minute, he spotted a golden shimmer near one of the goal posts and went into a deep dive – only to realise that it had simply been a reflection from the sun. When he saw another golden shimmer in the thirtieth minute, he hesitated just for a moment, only to realise in shock that Viktor was already diving for it. He swiftly followed into a fast dive, not believing his luck, when Viktor became distracted by a Bludger that one of the twins had sent after him. Just a hand width before Viktor, he managed to grab the struggling, little ball out of the air.
"Hogwarts wins 180 – 50," Bagman announced, causing tumultuous applause all over the Hogwarts grounds.
"Thanks Fred and George; it's only because of you that I managed to get the Snitch before Viktor did," Harry said to the twins, who returned huge smiles and mock bowed, causing Santa Paws to eagerly lick their faces.
During the victory party in the Great Hall, Bagman handed McGonagall a trophy. "This is the Trimagical Quidditch Cup, and it belongs now to Hogwarts until Beauxbatons, Durmstrang and Hogwarts compete again, hopefully sometime in the near future."
"While I don't wish to attend anozer Triwizard Tournament in ze near future," Madame Maxime spoke up, "as it is too dangerous for ze students, especially if they need to swim in water, I now invite the 'Ogwarts and Durmstrang Quidditch teams to visit Beauxbatons next year for anozer Trimagical Qudditch tournament."
Huge applause followed her invitation, and McGonagall as well as Professor Kolim, who had finally arrived from Durmstrang to support the Bulgarian team, immediately agreed to send their Quidditch teams to Beauxbatons to participate.
'Cool,' Harry thought in amazement. 'We get to visit Beauxbatons.'
'I'm going with you,' Santa Paws suddenly thought to him, causing Harry to look at the canine, who was spread out on his and Luna's feet.
'Of course,' he thought back, smirking.
HP
The weather on the day of the third task was anything but nice. Heavy rainfall and strong winds held Scotland in a firm grip, when the whole school gathered on the grounds for Bagman to announce the content of the task.
"There will be a maze on the roof of the castle," he began to explain, causing everyone to look upwards assessing the height of the school. "In the middle of the maze, there will be a trophy, and the first of the champions to reach the cup wins the Triwizard Tournament. It is a Portkey, which will take you down here, and afterwards, we're going to rescue the other champions from the roof. Now, you are supposed to begin climbing the wall in the sequence of the amount of points you have received in the first two tasks," he added, only to smirk.
"Ms. Delacour, Mr. Krum and Mr. Diggory all have 85 points each, so they will commence without time delay. Mr. Dumbledore has only 65 points, which means a delay of twenty minutes. The spectators can watch the champions climb the wall here on the screen, and once the first champion has reached the roof, the camera will change to the one that has been installed on the roof, so that you'll be up to date continuously."
Harry could not help grinning broadly, knowing that Cedric in his Crup Animagus form, the magical equivalent to a Jack Russel Terrier, was able to effortlessly climb walls.
The whole school observed in amazement how Cedric transformed and simply walked up the wall. Viktor summoned a broomstick and flew up the wall, which was difficult against the strong wind and the lashing rain, while Fleur more or less inefficiently tried to use her Veela powers to fly – which did not work out over the height of the castle, especially not in the unfortunate weather. Dumbledore, while held back on the ground, already transfigured a small stick into a Portkey that would take him up onto the roof.
However, by the time Dumbledore was allowed to activate his Portkey twenty minutes after the other champions had begun with the task, Cedric in his Animagus form had already reached the trophy cup. Activating the Portkey by taking the cup, he was back on the grounds, while the three other champions were engrossed in fights with all possible magical creatures in the maze.
"Cedric was lucky that none of them dared to attack a Crup," Harry chuckled aloud.
Bagman and Crouch quickly activated their own Portkeys. With a flick of their wands, they vanished the maze and handed Portkeys to the three remaining champions that would take them back down to the grounds.
When everyone was waiting for the official announcement of Cedric as the winner of the tournament, a man, whom Harry could not recall having ever seen before, suddenly stepped over to him holding out a wand to him.
'Don't touch that,' Santa Paws quickly warned him, and Harry hesitated. However, while he was still wondering what to do, Dumbledore who had been standing nearby reached out and grabbed the wand – only to become whisked away instantly, just before the unknown man vanished from the spot, too. Just before his Portkey activated, Santa Paws managed to get a large bite into his leg, which he spit out onto the ground in apparent disgust.
HP
'Let's go home,' Harry successively thought to Santa Paws and Luna, before he activated his own Portkey, holding Luna's arm close.
When they arrived in the room with the screen, he barely greeted Merlin and instructed the screen to search for Dumbledore – only to find him in what seemed to be a graveyard.
"A graveyard?" he spoke up in confusion.
HP
At Hogwarts, no one had noticed Dumbledore's abduction nor Harry's, Luna's and Santa Paws' absence, and Cedric was declared the winner of the tournament.
It was Professor McGonagall, who thanked the organisers profusely and handed out a bag full of galleons to Cedric – under huge applause.
HP
At the same time, Harry, Luna, Santa Paws and Merlin observed in horror how Voldemort was resurrected out of a large cauldron.
"Give me my wand," Voldemort said to the man who had gone through with the ritual to resurrect him.
"Yes my Lord," the man replied and handed him a wand – only to receive a silver limb in return for the one that he had sacrificed for the ritual.
Voldemort then turned to Dumbledore. "While I originally wanted to have Harry Potter help in my resurrection, it is a pleasure to see you in his place, Dumbledore."
"You should have accepted being dead, Tom. Your Death Eaters have all defied you by now," Dumbledore replied in his grandfatherly voice, causing Harry to roll his eyes in annoyance.
"Apparently, he isn't dead but very much alive," he growled. "Now instead of speaking with him just kill him."
"Well, that's Dumbledore," Santa spoke up, who had arrived in the meantime together with Sirius. "What do you expect from him?"
"Nothing," Harry replied, letting out a sigh of pure exasperation.
"We'll see about that," Voldemort replied to Dumbledore, before turning to his assistant. "Barty, show me your mark."
Harry observed how the evil wizard summoned his followers; however, during the next five minutes, only a dozen hooded figures arrived. 'Thank Merlin that Dad took Severus' Dark Mark off,' he thought, feeling extremely grateful towards his adopted father.
"This is the graveyard of Little Hangleton," Sirius suddenly spoke up. "I'll go and inform Meli."
While Voldemort took his time to speak with each of his followers, Harry saw that from the far side of the graveyard, a large group of Aurors appeared on the edge of the screen.
"Dobby," he called his trusted elf. "Go and turn the group of Aurors invisible to everyone but us."
"Of course, Harry Potter sir," Dobby replied and popped away in a blink, only to return as quickly.
Harry and the others observed how Voldemort began to fight Dumbledore, apparently unbeknownst that the Aurors attacked the Death Eaters from behind and quickly took them away by Portkeys. 'To Azkaban I hope,' Harry thought, contentedly.
"Pah, such a normal wand?" Voldemort teased the old wizard, casting a summoning charm, which Dumbledore managed to dodge. "Where's the elder wand, or have you lost it already?"
"It's not mine anymore," Dumbledore admitted, casting a couple of powerful spells against his opponent.
All of a sudden, a large snake slithered over the ground towards Dumbledore.
"That's Nagini, the last Horcrux," Santa informed them. "As soon as she is destroyed, Voldemort will be mortal again."
"Shall I go and kill her?" Harry suggested, assessing the size of the snake with mixed feelings.
"No," Santa replied, shortly, just when Harry more felt than he saw that Santa Paws suddenly vanished from his spot.
He uneasily observed how Nagini approached Dumbledore, feverishly thinking to Santa Paws, 'Santa Paws, where are you? Don't do anything stupid!'
'It's all right,' Santa Paws thought back, calmly.
A moment later, just after the large snake had bitten Dumbledore a couple of times, they saw Santa Paws appear on the screen with Holly in tow.
"They're probably invisible to everyone including the snake," Santa spoke up in a soothing voice.
"I hope so," Harry replied, feeling extremely anxious for his familiar, who was also his best friend, as well as the elf.
He observed with uneasiness how the snake's body became even larger and finally blew up into huge Christmas decorations. Among the colourful, bright decorations, a black, screaming cloud appeared, which Holly banished with a flick of his hand.
"Dumbledore! What did you do to my familiar?" Voldemort roared, causing Dumbledore to scoff.
"I did nothing, but it bit me," he replied, sounding very weak.
'Harry, do you want me to heal Dumbledore?' Santa Paws suddenly thought to him.
'Yes please,' Harry agreed. 'Even if I don't like him, I don't want him to die that way, let alone when he's only there instead of me,' he thought. He observed how Santa Paws pushed his magic into the old wizard, before he turned to Voldemort, letting out another bout of magic.
"What was that?" Harry wondered aloud, causing Santa to chuckle.
"You'll just have to ask your familiar what he did there," he replied in apparent amusement. "He surely didn't strengthen Voldemort's magic."
Harry noticed in amusement how the whole graveyard including Voldemort's and Dumbledore's robes brightened in Christmas decorations, while the two wizards fought each other.
"They both don't seem very powerful," Claire observed, and Harry silently agreed. 'I wonder what Santa Paws did to them,' he thought, as he impatiently waited for his familiar to return to his side.
"Why don't you just kill me already if that's your wish, Tom?" Dumbledore finally asked.
"I really should do that, as you won't be able to kill me anyway," Voldemort replied, smirking. "I have my Horcruxes, and it's not you who is destined to kill me anyway."
"Harry Potter is safe at Hogwarts, as I took it upon myself to meet you today," Dumbledore replied, causing Harry to scoff.
'As if that had been intentionally,' he thought in annoyance.
=But we are here, and we represent Harry Potter,= Santa Paws suddenly woofed, making himself and Holly visible to the two wizards. =Holly, please translate.=
Holly complied, and before either of the wizards could do as much as point their wand at them, Santa Paws and Holly both vanished from the spot.
Only then, Voldemort cast a series of killing curses at the spot, where they had been standing instants before. Dumbledore did not move but remained standing, where he was, simply observing Voldemort's actions.
'He should have used the opportunity to cast something good at Voldemort,' Harry growled to himself.
"He probably knows that he owes Santa Paws another life debt," Santa spoke up, still grinning, when Voldemort's body suddenly began to glow in a light green colour.
"Santa Paws and Holly," Harry blurted out, when his two best friends appeared right next to him, first hugging the canine and then the elf. "How dare you do such stunts? Do you even know how worried I was?"
Instead of a response, Santa Paws jumped up at him and fervently licked his face, until Harry gently pushed him away.
"What was it that you did to Voldemort to make him glow green right before returning here?" Luna enquired, smiling at the canine.
=That's for me to know and for everyone else to eventually find out,= Santa Paws replied, before he dashed away to find his brothers and sisters.
"Well, I just hope that he's going to die of it," Harry mused aloud.
Holly shook his head. "No Harry, neither Santa Paws nor I can do bad magic. Santa Paws could if the bad wizard was attacking Harry, but as he didn't, Santa Paws couldn't kill him, and Holly can't either," he patiently informed them, making Harry nod in understanding.
"That's all right then," he conceded. "Thanks so much for doing what you did, Holly."
By the time Harry returned his attention to the screen, the graveyard was deserted without a sign of either of the two wizards.
"What happened?" he asked; however, everyone had followed the conversation between him and Holly and was none the wiser.
tbc...
Thank you so very much for the many kind reviews for the previous chapter. Please let me know what you think of this chapter and what you expect from this story. Any ideas or opinions are welcome.
Next chapter: "The Wizengamot".