A disguised Harry and Nicholas made their way down Diagon Alley, blending in with the crowd perfectly. They had both chosen appearances that look related, hoping to go for a father and son relation.
It was fairly surreal to walk down the alley, given the large number of banners with his own confident smiling face, staring down at himself. Each of the banners had some sort of supportive phrase, or otherwise encouraging others to support 'The Champion-who-lived.'
A few apartments were flying Cedric Diggory banners, with perhaps an equal amount supporting Viktor Krum. Sadly, Harry couldn't see any banners for Fleur, although the occasional shop front had her poster up.
Harry recognised his image from moments after he had burst out of the dragon flame, such that the flames would occasionally flicker in the background of his posters. Similar posters had popped up in Hogsmeade, although nowhere near to the same extent.
"Everyone's gone mad over this tournament." Nicholas muttered to Harry. "It's the same pretty much everywhere, but not everyone is being as friendly as over here. In Spain their Aurors had to break up a street fight over people supporting you over Fleur."
"Why do they care so much?"
"I suspect they don't, not really. The tournament is of course a chance to compete, which bleeds into misplaced nationalistic pride. But mainly I believe people are just using the tournament as an excuse. For the most part, people are letting themselves be distracted by first the World Cup and now this, allowing them to ignore how the Galleon is deflating it's value and rising unemployment.
"But the worse things get in the real world, the more people are devoting to the tournament. Of course, as both tension and tempers rise, they aren't allowed to show their anger. Instead they unknowingly use it to fuel their belief in the champions, which can get violent if exposed to someone in a similar situation with opposite beliefs." Nicholas explained.
"I didn't know things were so bad." Harry replied quietly, shocked at what he was hearing.
"It probably isn't." Nicholas admitted, "Or at least, not for everyone. For the vast majority they haven't noticed a change, but there is enough discontent for it to be a trend instead of simple anomalies. Of course, it doesn't help that you were already a widely known figure, who was then quite outspoken about how your Ministry failed you.
"To some people, they instantly take that as a sign they were right. After all, if the slayer of a dark lord can be abused by his ministry, why would a nameless worker be spared the same fate. Then that cascades into the French and Norwegian Ministries, who were very publicly siding with their British counterpart up until your interview came out."
"But I didn't mean for that to happen! I just didn't want Rita to put me in a bad light, that's exactly what Lockhart told me to do!" Harry protested anxiously.
"I know, Harry. Trust me, I know. In all likelihood, this would've happened without you, it's just you were unfortunate enough to be picked as the 'people's person'. This has been brewing ever since the war first ended. The media has been circling the various ministries for a while now, looking for any open wounds.
"It's just you representing the perfect spearhead, a weapon the papers could abuse to hurt the ministry, all to sell more papers. You have to realise, the pureblood lords hold significant sway over the British Ministry, even after many were exposed as Death Eaters. But even completely combined, the pureblood lords make up less than a fourth of the British population, yet they are the only ones publicly profiting.
"But enough politics, we must get you some fashionable dress robes." Nicholas announced as they stopped in front of Twilfitt and Tattings.
Back in the Summer, when he had seen the requirement for dress robes in the school list, Dumbledore had assured him a charm to disguise his trench coat would suffice.
Unfortunately, while it would've been fine for a common guest, as a 'guest of honour' it was considered unacceptable. Not only would it apparently make him look lazy, which by extension would make Daphne look bad for being his date, but it would also insult the organisers.
By not taking the effort to dress appropriately, he would be silently conveying that he did not see the ball as something worth dressing up for. To Harry, he couldn't see the difference between transmuting a napkin into dress robes, or going to the shop and buying the exact same dress robes for a significant sum of money, but then he wasn't the one organising the ball.
Opening the door, a short violin tune played, seemingly coming out of the bouncing bell. The tune wouldn't be out of place at a ball, but within the otherwise nondescript shop it felt quite presumptuous to Harry.
Nevertheless, a finely dressed man hurried in from a backroom, smiling politely.
"Good morning gentlemen. I am Andrew Tattings of Twilfitt and Tattings, how may we help you today?"
"Good morning, we are looking for a full set of dress robes for my son here." Nicholas replied charmingly.
"You have certainly come to the right place, may I ask what the occasion is?" The man simpered.
"The Triwizard Tournament Yuletide Ball."
"Magnificent, that will certainly be the place to be this year. Budget?"
"500 Galleons budget, which we shall be expecting to see that reflected in the work." Nicholas stated, making Harry fight the need to roll his eyes. Yet another thing he didn't understand, spending half the prize money on some robes for one event.
"Of course, sirs, of course. At Twilfitt and Tattings we always strive to give our customers the best possible attire. I will of course need to take measurements."
What followed was several long minutes as tape measures flew around Harry, while Nicholas and the storekeeper talked business. After almost an hour, Harry was allowed to leave.
"I thought we might stop for some ice cream before returning to Hogwarts, my treat?" Nicholas asked, not that Harry was planning on turning down free ice cream.
"I was wondering how you were progressing with that egg? You haven't asked for my help, so I'm assuming you've got it handled?" Nicholas asked leadingly once they had sat down, causing Harry to shift awkwardly.
"Well, I've identified it's saying something in Mermish."
"Oh, what does it say?"
"I don't know, I haven't yet deciphered it." Harry muttered guiltily.
"Do not take me for a fool, Harry. All you'd need to do is drop it in water, don't pretend like such a leap in logic is beyond you." Nicholas chastised him.
"Yeah… I know. It just feels like if I don't know what's going to happen then I don't have to think about it, I can just pretend I'm not in the tournament."
"Ah, well can I just say that running from your problems will never work. I can understand not wanting to think about it, but if it would be far better to solve it now, then put it out of mind. If you solve it soon then you won't have to think about it until February, but you don't want to solve it in February and discover you need another month to prepare."
Harry nodded, understanding the logic in the man's words.
"I will also add that I am here entirely to help you, so I ask you don't waste either of our time by procrastinating. Now, anything else you want to do before we return to Hogwarts?"
Nicholas watched with pride as his apprentice summoned a ball of water, then took control of it, all within the same movement. In a great show of control, Harry then picked up his golden egg with the water and held it in the air, then used the water to open the latch.
Instead of screeching, the egg began emitting a song. Together, they listen to it looping several times before Harry eventually closed it again and vanished the water.
"They're going to take something that belongs to me?" Harry asked angrily.
"Perhaps, but let us go through the clue before jumping to conclusions. Try and talk me through it."
"Well, 'come seek us where our voices sound' obviously means I need to go underwater, which I assume means the black lake has Merpeople. 'We've taken what you'll sorely miss', they are going to steal something from me, probably hidden it with them.
"'An hour long you'll have to look,' the time limit of the task. 'But past an hour, the prospect's black. Too late, it's gone, it won't come back.' If I don't finish the task in time I'll never get my things back."
"And what do you believe is the thing they would take?" Nicholas asked.
"Well, my Gauntlet is extremely important to me, but good luck to them if they want to take it. Likewise my Cloak is easily something I could never replace. Other than that, pretty much everything I have could be replaced, especially anything mithril."
"I would propose that not all of your competitors would have the same attachment to objects. I would suggest there is only one thing all the champions would be determined to save… hostages."
"So, if I don't save them within an hour, they will die?" Harry demanded.
"It's possible, but at the very least I fail to see Albus allowing that to happen. I'd say the Ministry would also prevent it, considering having a non-contestant die in a task would be extremely bad for their image. Regardless, we will ensure you can save them within the hour, so we don't have to find out."
"Right you lot, in the hall." Moody barked, opening the doors into the great hall. Harry had been surprised when Moody had told them where their next lesson would be at the end of their last lesson. He was even more surprised to see the Slytherins joining them.
Inside the hall, a raised purple duelling stage dominated the middle of the hall. After taking the register, Moody looked over the group.
"Get your wands, then put your stuff over there. You're here for the next two periods, so get comfy. Nice and simple lesson today, we'll be duelling. Basic rules, two people go up to duel, winner stays on. When we reach Zabini we'll loop back to the start, until everyone has gone three times. The three students with the most wins don't have to do homework."
As most of the students rushed over to drop off their stuff, Harry took the time to surreptitiously remove all of his mithril, placing them in his pockets. Once everyone was ready, Moody barked out "Boot, Brocklehurst, you're up first."
"You'll go easy on me, right?" Daphne muttered from his side.
"Don't worry, I'll make sure you're healthy enough to attend the yule ball." Harry jokingly replied, which strangely did not seem to reassure her.
On stage, Boot won after hitting Brocklehurst with an expelliarmus. Bulstrode was next, who also seemed unaffected by Boot's expelliarmus. Boot was so surprised he didn't even move when Millicent's stupefy shot towards him.
Corner also lost against Bullstrode, but Stephen Cornfoot was able to stop her with an incarcerous spell. Then it was Crabbe's turn. In a shocking twist to everyone outside of Harry's group, Crabbe easily defeated Cornfoot, Davis, Entwhistle, Justin Finch-Fletchley and Goldstein.
By the time Goyle took to the stage to face his ex-friend, the student's were getting excited. Of course, it was no battle. Goyle fired one sluggish blasting curse, which Crabbe easily deflected before returning a disarming spell.
"Greengrass, you're up. Let's see if you can beat Crabbe's streak."
Despite how much Vincent had improved since getting Harry's help, Daphne had also improved, while already starting from a skilled witch. Daphne blocked both Crabbe's blasting and disarming with an ice shield, which easily absorbed the attacks.
Twirling her wand, blunt spikes burst from the shield, flying towards Crabbe. He replied with a barely contained burst of flame, which did stop the spikes. The fire did absolutely nothing to stop her stupefy, which struck him right in the chest.
Dazed, Vincent stumbled into Daphne's petrificus totalus, which did finally remove him from the competition. Both Sue Li and Morag Macdougal were easily beaten, while Draco simply let himself get hit. Nott put up a fair defence, but was unable to get close to touching her, then Parkinson and Patil were both easily defeated.
Finally "Potter, show them how it's done."
Sighing, Daphne held her wand up as they bowed, before instantly starting into a blistering assault. Given how relaxed she had been in her previous duels, Harry suspected she had been conserving her magic.
Harry's dull blue shield stopped all of her spells, while he physically dodged the spikes and blades. Her final move was a rush of water, which began swirling around him in a whirlpool.
Grinning, he dropped the blue shield and with two anti-clockwise twirls and a thrust towards the floor, a green shield formed a column around him. When he had used it before his third year, the shield had been opaque. After almost two years of practice, the shield was barely visible.
With a snap of her wand, the water rose around Harry and bashed against his shield, only to be brushed off without issue. The water drew back slightly, only to grow icy spikes as it once again crashed against his shield.
Unnoticed, Harry sent three disarming spells towards her. Each spell flew as fast as he was possible, making them near impossible to dodge. With a swish of her wand, her shield blocked two of the spells and took the final one with it.
Looking back at Harry, she realised her mistake when a jet of water wrapped around her, now under Harry's command. Desperately trying to regain control over the water, she found herself unable to counter Harry's iron will. A flick of Harry's wand then transfigured the water into heavy chains, which easily restrained her.
The next student to face him was Lisa Turpin, who he defeated by forming a wall of air, which physically pushed her off the stage. Zabini fell to the same trick, with the wall of air easily going around his weak shield charm. Then Boot was once again on stage.
Terry confidently cast Finite Incantatem, causing a wave of magic to erupt and undo any spells. Unfortunately for Terry, Harry's wall of air was completely unaffected.
"Counter charms are for spells only, does his wall of air look like a spell to you?" Moody questioned gruffly, "When faced with the unknown, you can't just try one attempt and expect it to work. Brocklehurst, you're up."
Once again, he used his wall of air. Instead of trying to dispel the wall, Brocklehurst sent a disarming jinx at him. Harry could appreciate it as a good idea, since the wall did nothing to stop the spell. Unfortunately for Brocklehurst he easily sidestepped the jinx, leaving her to get struck by the wall.
"A good attempt, if you can't stop the magic, stop the one wielding the magic. Bulstrode." Harry wished Moody would wait until after he had won before giving the students tips on how to beat him, but he supposed that would go against the point of a lesson.
To his great surprise, as soon as Bulstrode rose from her bow, she made two anti-clockwise twirls with her wand, ending with a thrust towards him and incanting "Ne Motus!".
The result was an opaque green shield appearing across the stage. His wall of air crashed against the shield but was unable to penetrate it, causing the watching students to cheer. Unfortunately for Bulstrode, the backlash from the shield knocked her to the ground, preventing her from capitalising on her defence.
Harry was surprised she still remembered that spell from when Lockhart had taught it to them two years ago. Although, with a wince he supposed she could've remembered it after seeing him use it minutes earlier to stop Daphne's water attack.
Shrugging, Harry brought his wand up high before whipping it down, then thought 'Facea Volare', causing a transparent wave of purple magic to whipped down the stage. Being a spell, the wave passed through Bulstrode's green shield effortlessly, then proceeded to pick her up and launch her backwards.
Michael Corner tried to copy Bulstrode's shield, only for his shield to briefly flash, then shattered spectacularly. It didn't even matter, since Harry's expelliarmus struck him right in the hand.
Cornfoot also cast the ne motus spell, but also dodged the disarming jinx. Harry followed up with another facea volare wave, forcing Cornfoot to drop his shield and jump over the wave. With a flick of his wrist, Harry sent a jet of air towards the still airborne Cornfoot, while simultaneously conjuring a net with his wand and trapping the boy.
Finally, Crabbe stepped up. After bowing, Crabbe took a note out of Daphne's book and launched a barrage of spells towards Harry, causing him to shield. Several blasting spells successfully pushed Harry backwards, dangerously close to the edge of the stage.
Letting go of the shield, Harry summoned his wall of air and launched it towards Vincent. Having grown used to fighting both Harry and Daphne, who preferred elemental attacks, he used a great slash and was able to physically push the air around him.
Even with magic helping, the end push came down to the user's physical ability to move the force, making it fairly underused; Vincent had strength to spare. The resulting noise of displaced air had several people covering their ears.
In an impressive show of speed, Vincent moved seamlessly from redirecting the air to summoning a dull orange ne magicae shield; the twin to the green ne motus. The ne magicae shield would only stop magical attacks, but was able to easily block Harry's disarming and stupefying spells.
Thrusting forwards with his wand, Harry then launched a large javelin straight through Vincent's orange shield. Twisting, Vincent was able to grab the javelin, right as Harry transfigured it into a net, which wrapped itself around him.
Flicking his wand, Vincent managed to lift most of the net off himself, allowing him to send a retaliatory jet of fire. Rather than redirect the fire or stop it, Harry simply covered himself in a flame-freezing charm.
Under the cover of the fire, Harry swirled his wand around and summoned a rope, which he then used to ensnare Vincent. The rope combined with what was left of the net, forcing Vincent's wand out of his hand.
Davis fell to a disarming spell, while Entwhistle was hit with a stunning spell. When facing Justin, after sending a small smile, Harry sent a stream of magic towards him. Justin predictably sidestepped, letting the magic carry on behind him. Behind his back, the spell erupted and took control over the air.
Forming yet another wall of air, Harry now pulled it towards him, making it slam into Justin's unaware back. Surprised, Justin was launched forward and was unable to stop the knockback jinx which struck him in the face.
Both Goldstein and Goyle were easy to beat, meaning it was time to face Daphne again. This time their duel was far closer, since while Daphne had been allowed to rest, Harry had been fighting non-stop.
In light of that, Harry did his best to end the duel as quickly as possible, ending it by landing several exploding charms to her side. The resulting explosion was enough to launch her off the narrow stage, despite the shield protecting her.
Two fights later, he was bowing to Draco for a second time. Unlike in his 'duel' against Daphne, Draco didn't let himself get beaten. In his initial onslaught, he summoned two large snakes, shot two disarming spells towards Harry and raised a shield.
Draco's speed had grown scarily fast under Harry's tutelage, with the boy being limited entirely by how fast he could incant the spells. By the time he perfected wordless casting, he'd be able to match Harry's speed.
Regrettably for Draco, he was not yet fast enough to match Harry. The two snakes were vanished moments after they appeared, while the spells were deflected back at Draco. He followed it up with a deliberately slowed stunning spell, then waited exactly two seconds.
When he mentally reached zero, he launched a shield buster charm. From numerous tests within his workshop, he knew how fast he could send both a shield buster and stunner. As such the shield buster overtook the stunner and struck Draco's shield, ripping a hole big enough for the stunner to slip in and hit him.
Realising he would need his strength, Harry focused on speed and accuracy over brute power for the five following duels, with only Nott presenting the hint of a problem.
"An excellent sweep by Potter, but you can see he's feeling the strain. For those of you that can't shield, don't just sit there nice and pretty and wait for Potter to hit you. Move around, you have the entire stage, don't cower in the corner. Use wider spells, spells he can't dodge." Moody instructed, "Boot, you're up, final chance to get a win."
Seemingly taking Moody's words to heart, while possibly being inspired by the previous duels, the students changed their approach. For most of the duels, Harry found himself far more heavily on the defence, which was fine with him. The simple truth was, the average student wasn't strong enough to threaten his defences.
The result was, he could feel himself regenerating his magic even as spells splashed against his shields. It wasn't regenerating quickly, certainly not enough to get him close to full power, but enough to give him a net-neutral cost. Crabbe put a stop to that.
Harry only held his shields throughout the first attack, with each blasting curse quantifiably costing Harry's magic. The moment Vincent stopped to take a breath, Harry began firing his spells. The first was a dark blue jinx which zigzagged wildly, followed by a yellow hex that moved in a helix path.
Finally Harry sent a facea volare wave down the stage. Vincent's wide shield blocked both the blue hex and purple wave, but the yellow helix hex corkscrewed over the shield and hit his shoulder. Instantly his arm slackened as the tranquillizing spell took effect, causing his wand to drop out of his numb hand.
While Crabbe had been defeated, Harry was starting to feel the burn. By the time he disarmed Goyle, he was dreading the following duels.
Rising from their bow, Harry and Daphne raced to be the first to finish casting. Daphne summoned a huge wave of water, which was tall enough to touch the rafters of the Great Hall. She then flicked her wand and simultaneously froze and fired several ice spikes, while also pushing the wave to come crashing down on Harry.
Meanwhile, Harry had predicted Daphne's favoured move and had raised the green ne motus shield. He then frantically drew an alchemical rune, writing directly on the shield itself. It was the first time in the lesson he had needed to draw from knowledge unavailable to the other students.
Moments before the first ice spike was due to crash against the shield, Harry finished the rune with a flourish and pressed his hand against the inner triangle. Almost unseen, the rune lit up with Harry's emerald magic, almost completely hidden by the soft green shield.
With each spike that shattered against the shield, the energy from the backlash was directed into the rune. Obediently, the rune then transmuted the energy into Harry's magic, which then forced its way into his hand and into his core. The feeling of having the magic inserted in such a way was deeply unpleasant, but it allowed him to regain his energy.
When the wave crashed against his shield, the literal flood of magic made him wince, even as his reserves filled drastically. With the new breath of magic, Harry banished the water back at Daphne. Between the duelling shield around the stage and Harry's shield at the end, the water had no choice but to turn on it's summoner.
Thrusting his arm out, Harry then summoned his wall of air again. Seeing the water come towards her, Daphne raised her own ne motus shield, hoping to withstand it just as Harry had. What she didn't expect was for the water pressure to suddenly intensify as Harry's wall of air forced its way towards her.
The wall itself shattered against her shield, but the backlash was strong enough to physically push her off the stage anyway. Disgruntled, she immediately stood up and huffed.
As he vanished the water and cleared the stage, Moody announced "And that is why you shouldn't stay in a corner. If Greengrass had been just three feet further forward, she'd have landed on the stage and been able to continue fighting. In the real world, that could've easily been a cliff she just fell off. Li, you're up!"
After just two short duels, Harry found himself facing Draco. If he had been unable to draw power from Daphne's attack, Harry knew Draco would've easily beaten him. As it stood, Draco had recovered from his last duel, while Harry was at barely half his original strength.
With that in mind, Harry instantly began a chain of spells, preventing Draco from retaliating. Each spell was deliberately underpowered, making them easy to shield against, while being strong enough that Draco couldn't let them hit him. With his off hand, Harry then started drawing a rune in the air.
Glaring, Draco could only watch as the rune was finished, unable to try anything due to the onslaught of spells. At first, he couldn't tell what the rune had done, but then he realised he was finding it harder to breathe. A few moments later he realised the air felt significantly lighter.
Soon he found it hard to breathe, which was when his shield broke. He tried to summon a new shield, only to realise he didn't have enough air in his lungs to speak the incantation.
Sluggishly ducking under the next spells, Draco desperately thrust his wand out and simply released his magic. To his disappointment, the resulting bolt was easily deflected by Harry, even as Draco's vision started to darken.
Before Draco could properly fall from lack of oxygen, Harry was able to nail him with a disarming jinx, then instantly cut his rune in half. The air that the rune had greedily summoned and held onto was finally allowed to leave and flooded back over the stage.
At the same time, Moody dropped the stage shield, allowing the air in the hall to leak onto the stage.
"That's a very dangerous move Potter, you'd better hope it doesn't escape from you and backfire." Moody pointed out as he checked Draco's breathing.
Tiredly, Harry finished off Turpin and Zabini, collapsing onto the stage the moment his stunner hit Zabini and ended the match.
"Excellent. Well then, that leaves Potter with a new record of 43 wins, Greengrass with 7 wins and Crabbe with 6. As promised, you three won't have to do today's homework. With that said, I do believe it's my turn!" Moody cackled as he took to the stage.
Stunned, Harry awkwardly got to his feet as his teacher bowed. The moment Harry finished bowing in return, Moody started marching towards him. Alarmed, Harry formed the wall of air and sent it towards Moody, while also beginning the spell chain that had been so successful against both Draco and Tonks.
Unfortunately, Moody ripped the air from Harry's control with a jerk of his staff, then began blocking or redirecting the spells. The entire time, he did not stop his march forward. The only time Moody slowed was when Harry raised a Ne Motus shield directly in front of him, but that only stopped Moody long enough for him to stab the shield with his staff.
The shield dissolved from where the staff hit it, through which Moody continued his march. Harry's conjured rope was incinerated before it even drew close. Harry desperately summoned a rock, then banished it straight up. Even as it rose into the air, Harry charmed it into a raven and animated it to fly behind Moody and attack him.
Moody's magical eye easily followed the bird, with his wand snapping out to freeze the bird in place. During the time he was somewhat distracted, Harry covered himself in disillusionment and notice-not charms. Before Harry could even try and use his invisibility, Moody had flicked his staff forwards and cast a silent counter spell, shredding Harry of his spells.
With only a few feet to go, Harry sent a burst of fire, which Moody stopped with a tap of his staff. Moody then followed it up by raising his wand and filling Harry's vision with the bright red of a stunning spell.
Awakening with a start, Harry was greeted with the sight of Moody's disfigured face leaning over him.
"That wasn't very fair." Harry muttered as Moody helped him to his feet.
"No lad, I suppose it wasn't." Moody agreed cheerfully. "Now, who can tell me what Potter did wrong?" He asked the class.
"He wasn't strong enough to beat you." Nott called out.
"Being strong enough isn't something he has control over, so try again." Moody shot down.
"He didn't know enough to beat you?" Padma asked
"Perhaps, but I do not believe it was lack of knowledge that allowed me to beat him."
"Well of course you beat him, you're a retired senior auror! How would anyone be able to beat you!" Justin argued.
"I've been beaten before lad. I'd still be an auror if I hadn't been beaten." Moody replied, indicating his eye and leg, causing the students to grow awkwardly silent. "On top of that, I was holding back severely. Believe me, if I had seen Potter as a threat, I wouldn't limit myself to stunners and deflecting.
"The question is, why was Potter unable to stop me?"
"He had wasted most of his magic." Daphne answered.
"Exactly! But why."
"Because he had just fought the entire class twice… and kept showing off" She replied.
"Precisely! Potter was tired from fighting so many opponents, why was he tired? Because for his first few fights he kept showing off. That wall of air he used, it was undeniably effective. But it was no more effective than a disarming spell." Moody explained.
"Truth is, even if Potter had been as meticulous with his magic as possible, he'd still be too weak. That is because fighting over 40 opponents is always taxing. Back during the war, because every other soldier was busy elsewhere Dumbledore was required to defend an important position completely alone. The Dark Lord then sent his Death Eaters one at a time.
"Every Death Eater was easily beaten, but Dumbledore grew tired, then the Dark Lord himself showed up. I was on the front line for that battle, so believe me when I say it was as legendary as any of their other duels. But the difference was this time Dumbledore started the duel already exhausted.
"Eventually, Dumbledore was forced to retreat, marking it as the first Dumbledore lost a battle since his fight with Grindelwald. That battle would then go on to be the turning point of the war, where the ministry went from winning to slowly losing."
"So what do you suggest?" Malfoy asked after a pause.
Surprisingly, Moody actually sighed before answering, "In truth, there is little you can do, it is a smart strategy for a reason. My personal answer is to prevent reinforcements arriving, whether that be erecting anti-portkey wards, or summoning a divine fire spell.
"If that isn't an option, try and find ways to recover. For those of you that missed it, Potter used his knowledge of alchemical runes to modify his shield. The result was that when Greengrass' attack struck his shield, the backlash was used to regenerate him.
"I must admit, I haven't seen anything like that before, although I imagine it's quite painful. In a professional duelling gauntlet like this, you could draw out the fight. With enough control, you can dictate when the round ends."
"How did we fare against the other students?" Goldstein asked excitedly.
"Well, Potter's 43 wins puts him ahead of the entire school so far, a record I don't see him losing. Diggeroy in Hufflepuff is in second place with 23 wins, while Shinso in Slytherin managed to get 17 wins. Of course, a big part of that comes down to the position within the register."
"What do you mean by their position, Professor?" somebody asked.
"Take this group, if Potter had been last and Greengrass had been first, then she'd most likely have gotten a much higher score. Alternatively, if Greengrass had been right before Potter, then Crabbe would've potentially gotten more wins.
"To be truthful, this test has never been fair, nor was it meant to be fair. This lesson is to show you all that you have more to learn. How many of you here lost, when a shield charm would've saved you? Then if Potter knew of spells with lower magical costs, would he have been so weakened when I stepped in.
"One final note before I let you go, would you care to explain to the class why you didn't bother to fight back against Greengrass, Malfoy?"
"Of course sir. I knew Harry would be the one to beat, so if I wanted a good score I'd need every advantage I could get. By letting Daphne beat me, I was saving my energy for the important duel, while Harry was weakened by fighting most of the class." Draco smugly explained.
"Excellent, take five points to Slytherin! That is what you all need to learn, the ability to think ahead. Even though Potter was visibly tired throughout the final round, almost all of you were equally tired. Now, apart from our three winners, I want all of you to hand me three feet of parchment on how you personally could've done better."
Considering I wrote both halves of Moody's lesson over two consecutive nights, I was quite shocked to realise that alone was longer than most of my chapters… Also, due to a review that I am unable to reply due to them being a guest, I am forced to add the following section;
Things I could've explained last chapter:
- The Greengrass curse: To start with, if you are looking at the original Greengrass to accept the curse and going "He is an idiot for sacrificing every 7th child." Then you have missed the point, he was an idiot for summoning a fae in the first place.
Then you have their powers. You are completely correct in that their Ice Boon isn't all that impressive, it isn't meant to be. Why would the Fae waste it's magic to give the family a good power, when that wasn't specified in their deal? Their boon simply allows the Greengrass family to possibly have a better time controlling ice, which is the power of that Fae. As such, the Fae was 100% acting within it's contract.
Also, something I thought I did explain, but might have forgotten, the ice boon isn't powered by the sacrifice of the child. The ice magic is fed entirely from the family magic, which is no stronger than any other magical family. The magic from the child goes to the Fae as power, but the Fae doesn't send any power back to the family.
Finally, "why not negotiate for a bigger number between family members?" Well, that's because the Fae wouldn't have accepted the deal. It's not like Lord Greengrass could say "You will give me ice powers and you will get every 1,000th child" because the Fae would just spit in his face and leave.
Things I think need explaining:
- Moody's duelling gauntlet: Moody said, the duel really wasn't designed to be a fair competition, especially since the student I deem closest to Harry in terms of strength is Daphne. In that, Moody was trying to be as fair as possible by having Daphne in the group, since she could defeat Harry, but in doing so would be weakened and allow other students to beat her to have a chance at getting wins.