A/N: So, an update. It's only been a month and I've kept my promise to update before the end of February. I know, surprising isn't it?

A/N 2: There has been minor updates and edits to chapter 1, 2, 3 and 14 due to someone pointing out an issue with my labelling of any 'rape' warnings. I've now gone back and bolded any sections which illuded to this happening, but not when Aileen was talking about it or thinking about the consequences on her emotional health and social relations. I'd like to remind my readers, that this story is rated as M.

A/N 3: I'm currently doing some minor edits to chapters 43 and onwards because I've noticed some English error that escaped my initial notice. You don't have to go back and read those chapters because the edits won't change anything about the story or the flow of what you've read.

Chapter 54: Year four: Challenge of Words and Knowledge P1

In the week between the final day of the duelling tournament and the day of the second task, Aileen disappeared from the sight of the school. She spent the time hidden in the Room of Requirement, talking with the founders and training. She didn't want to split her attention to the lesson and homework she already knew when she had far bigger problems to focus on. And she definitely didn't want to deal with the students who wanted to know how she got so good at duelling that she was able to defeat students with more practise and experience then her.

The only time she left the room was to attend two meetings she had with the Warding team. They had changed their meeting times with her to after school hours on Thursday and Tuesday since they'd discovered her weekends were far busier than her weekdays. They'd mostly gotten around to finishing the prep work and they would be ready to re-do the wards during easter, even if they wouldn't be allowed to do so until the summer. Because the wards were so old and powerful, they couldn't make mass changes, bringing layers up or down, until the school was empty of everyone except the holders and those working on the wards.

Fred and George were the only two people, besides Dobby, who she told her location too. Not even Hermione and Ron knew where she had hauled up, but then she had never revealed to them the secret of the founder's portraits or her old training room. They were still her friends, her best friends, but she was hiding so much from them already, that it was easy for her to hide more from them. The only thing she was concealing from the twins was her demi-god heritage, so it was easier to let them in on her hiding places and her training.

The twins reported that the teachers weren't happy with her little disappearing act, but that the headmaster had soothed it over with them by pointing out that she was maintaining high grades despite all off her other commitments and that until that week she had been doing all homework assigned – plus catch-up work from missing lessons. She could afford to not show for a week for her work commitment – something that not even Professor Snape could argue against since her potions work was some of the best in the class (it had to be with her training under Madam Pomfrey).

"How did you get the teachers to let you miss lessons?" Fred questioned.

It was the day before the second task, and Aileen had asked the room to make a heated swimming pool which she and the twins were now relaxing in.

"I'm a star pupil and I have the headmaster's respect." Aileen answered, eyes close as she simple floated.

"Well, if you want to spread some of that good opinion our way; we could do a lot with a week away from lessons." George spoke with mischief clear in his tone.

"Well, your grades are good but you'll never get that leeway because of your pranks. Besides you don't need that time." Aileen flicked water at Fred who was floating suspiciously close.

"You ready for tomorrow?" Fred asked.

"As ready as I can be." Aileen hummed. Without any true idea of what she was facing, all she could do was practise a wide variety of spells and hope that her instincts and knowledge would be good enough to get her through. Her riddle 'elements' implied that she would be facing against magic related to the elements and she had been looking up counters and other magics related.

"How you feeling?" George asked softly.

Aileen sighed, allowing herself to sink under the water. Fred and George had talked at some point, discussing the ways the stress she had been placed under – not just this year – but the last three as well, and the amount of work she was trying to get through each day. The stress of work, as well as her emotional turmoil of a past, had cause them to take up the cause of making sure that she was coping with everything and that she wasn't drowning under those emotions. As they were the closest people to her, the only people she saw on a daily basis who were paintings, they had the best hold on her different moods – no matter how good she was at hiding and concealing.

"Well, I think that answers that question." Fred's voice came across as muffled to Aileen's ears because of the echoing effect of the water.

"You know what this calls for…" George said before he dived off into the water and pushed off the wall to get to were Aileen was floating under the water. Fred, who was closer to Aileen and not near the wall, simply went bottom up and used his arms to propel himself at Aileen.

Aileen twisted to avoid both their reaching arms, her flexibility and manoeuvrability in the water allowing her to begin a game of chase.

It was time for the second task to begin. Aileen had been walked down to the lake by Professor McGonagall. Being escorted ensured the dual purpose of making sure she was on time, and not allowing other students to harass her. Fred, George, Ron and Hermione had wished her good luck over breakfast and promised to help her escape the hordes when she won the task. They all had faith that she would be able to win the tournament, trusting that her stupid luck and ability to survive the most dangerous of things would transfer over into this dangerous tournament. None of the other contestants had her experience in battle and against creatures.

As they got closer to the lake, Aileen was able to see what the second task consisted off. The entire area had been cordoned off and Dumbledore had put up a magical via two days before to hide the set up. Not even Aileen had been allowed past despite her connection to the people of the lake. The task didn't actually use the lake; however, the Samul Grievance needed the open space and access to a natural sauce of water so Aileen had gotten permission for the organisers to work on the surface and near the edge of the lake after a magical oath had been given that no harm would come to the denizens of the water.

Hovering over the lake were four rows of interconnected boxes. One of those boxes was submerged under the water. At the minute, the boxes were black to the viewers, but Aileen knew that there was rune work to keep them afloat and also to turn the outer walls invisible from the outside so the audience could see what was going on. Each row of boxes was aligned from different points of the edge of the lake and working inwards to ensure that the view of the inside was not blocked from the audience.

McGonagall walked Aileen to the entrance to the box furthest from the school, where the door had a sigil above. It seemed the tournament organisers had realised the significance off her statement in the previous task. Instead of the school crest, as everyone else had, the crest she had worn to the first task of a blue phoenix's, sword, torch and staff was above the door. They hadn't included the details contained within the boarder, it seemed that the smaller images hadn't been included because no one had gotten that close of a look. Below the crest, her first riddle had been written on the door.

My first is in stressful not in trustful

My second is in natal but not in tan

My third is in grinder but not in grind

My fourth is in sentimentalist but not in saintliness

My fifth is in danger but not in grand

My sixth is in prescient but not in triceps

My seventh is in commentary but not in necromancy

My eighth is in masterwork but not in teamwork

"Champions," Samul Grievance spoke with an amplified voice. "I hope that you managed to answer the riddle contained within your egg. To enter the task, you must speak the answer. There are five individual tasks that you will face within, and to move onto the next, you must answer another riddle."

"This task is about your ability to think through problems, showing intelligence, and diversity in magic." Bagman took over as Samul took his place with the other judges. "On the cannon, the task begins."

Aileen drew her wand, and stared fixed on the door – blocking out the sounds of the cheering crowd who were gathering on temporary but low level stands which had been set up. Close enough to see but away from the water's edge. She disliked being put on display like this, but there was nothing she could do about it. When her fifth year started, she would be damned if she allowed herself to be as exposed as she was this year – four years in a row of life-threatening situations was more than enough for her. Hopefully, the new wards would keep threats out and Dumbledore and Sirius's active political movement would keep anyone else out.

"BANG!"

Aileen placed her hand on the door, and spoke in a calm stone. "Elements."

The door clicked open. Aileen cautiously stepped inside, taking in everything. The room was much bigger on the inside then it looked be on the outside – something which she expected to be the cases in all the sections of the task. There was a bridge before her, on either side what looked like a worryingly large fall. There were runes engraved at equal distances along both walls, but they were too far away for her to make out details.

Unwilling to step forward into a trap, Aileen pulled a rock out of her 'item bag'; placed it on the floor and transfigured a dog. She sent the dog forward. Just as it came in line with the first set of runes, a blast of fire came from the left in a stream until it reached the right and was bounced back. The fire continued, until her very charred dog made it out of the stream of fire on the other side – between the first and second set of runes.

Wanting to see what the entire task consisted off, she continued to send her very charred dog forward. The next set of runes triggered wind, which blew a strong gale across the path and knocked her dog off. Pulling another rock from her bag, she sent out a snake. Despite being low to the ground and under the carving of the runes, it still triggered the fire. But it made it out unscorched because there was a two-inch gap between the bridge and the fire. Reaching the wind, the snake low wind resistance allowed it to make it through the gale without being knocked off.

The third set of runes triggered an extremely powerful stream of water which slammed into and over the bridge so there wasn't a gape. Without the weight to hold it in place, the snake got washed away. Another rock became a bird, and a second rock a snake. The bird carried the snake over the fire. The snake dragged the bird through the wind. The bird flew the snake over the water. Leaving the bird in the gap between water and the last runes, she controlled the snake and sent it forward. Unlike the previous traps, there was no blast of mud. Instead, the bridge started shaking and pieces grumbled beneath the snake sending it into the pit below.

With a long, drawn out sigh, Aileen pulled four rocks from her bag and crouched on the ground. Placing the rocks next to each other, she fused them into one large rock. Once she had a rock the size of her hand, she began enlarging it until it was around the size of the door. She then repeated the process, until she had two slabs of rocks. Into the centre of each of the stone slabs, she drew the Kenaz rune in order to act as the conductor for the protection runes of Algiz and Eihwaz, increasing the resistance of the stone against fire.

Levitating each of the stone slaps, Aileen walked before them and into the flames that burst into existence and slammed into each of the stones that protected her.

Once she was past the flames, she lowered the slabs to the floor and faced the next step: wind, and enemy she was familiar with from her time in the skies. The easiest way to fight wind, was not to stop it, but to counter it. When she had sent her transfigured animals forward, the wind had only come from the one direction unlike the fire which came from both.

Wind was not the easiest element for her to work with, but she had been practising hard since she broke the riddle to be able to master all the elements to the to an equal degree, except for water which she is naturally better at due to her genetics and the fact that it didn't use her wizarding magic. one of the spells that she had learnt was basically called 'wind shield', and it was this that she was going to use to get past this element.

Spinning her wand in a complete circle to her left without rotating her wrist, and then to her right, left again Aileen cast: 'Tunsphaera ventclypeus". She kept repeating the wand movement until she had built up two swirling circles of clockwise rotating air which covered her from ankle till about two inches above her head. Once the wind shield was the size that she wanted it, she maintained them by circling her wand in front of her as she walked forward.

The wind came into contact with the shield on her left and was caught in the swirl and drawn over her head and behind her to be pulled into the second one. If she'd only created the shield on her left, she'd be forced to push against and stand strong against the wind. Dispersing the wind around her into the second shield meant she didn't have to fight against the wind, instead she worked with its natural properties.

Stepping out of the wind, she dropped the shield. Without pausing strid, she walked into the jet of water and kept going until she came out the other side. If anyone questioned what she had done, she would simply say that all her robes had water repelling wards sown into them because of her role as ambassador to the mer-people. And they did have such runes, she just didn't activate them because there was no need to.

Finally, she was faced with the last challenge of this chamber: Earth.

Looking around the area, Aileen smiled as she spotted that the wall around the door was made off wood. From her bag, she pulled some string which she stretched and thickened into rope. Transfiguring the bird, which she had left at this stage, into an arrow she tied the rope to it. Using a banishing charm, she sent the arrow into the wood of the door. To make sure the arrow and rope stayed stuck and wouldn't fall out, she cast a long-distance transfiguration to turn the arrow and the wood it was stuck in, into stone which also trapped the rope.

Aileen tugged against rope with as much weight as she could to make sure that it was secure. Stepping back, she jumped as far as she could while holding the rope. Just before she landed, the ground started crumple and disappearing in spots instead of falling, she pulled herself forward with the rope until she was out of the danger zone.

Cancelling the transfiguration on her rope, she put it back in her bag before looking to the door and the new riddle:

I am the third from a sparkle bright,

I thrive throughout the day and night,

Deep in the path of a cows white drink,

I've had thousands of millions of years to think,

But one of my creatures is killing me,

And so the question I ask to thee,

Is Who Am I?

Authors Note: I've decided to split the second task up despite how short the chapters are because I am issuing a challenge to my readers: what is the answer to my riddle?

Edited: 25/02/2021

Word count: 2,731