At breakfast on the morning of the task, Dean kept urging Dudley to eat as much as possible. "You need your strength, Dud," he said. Dudley piled a couple of extra slices of toast on his plate. Across from him, Neville was silent, staring down at his bacon and eggs as he ate, apparently deep in thought about what was to come. Despite his initial confident about this task, now it was the day itself, Dudley was feeling the familiar butterflies in his stomach again.

"Good morning," a dreamy voice said. Dudley didn't even need to look up to tell it was Luna. She sat down next to him and helped herself to a slice of toast from his plate. "I'll be wearing my lion hat today, so you can hear it roar while you're in the maze."

"Cheers, Luna," Dudley said, shoving a second slice of toast in his mouth.

Ron was grumbling about having exams to sit. "As if we can concentrate proper when we've got the Third Task to watch later. They should give us the day off."

Cho Chang, who had joined them for breakfast agreed. "I'm so nervous and I'm not even going in there!" she said. "Make sure you get there first, Dudley, I've bet my limited edition set of Quidditch Stars of Great Britain and Ireland gobstones with Anthony Goldstein that you win, she said.

"Great, more pressure," Dudley grumbled, starting on his third piece of toast.

Cho didn't hear him. "He's offered his Quidditch World Cup set—it's rare that is, you could only get it from a prize draw. It has all the stars from the last tournament."

She was wolfing down a sausage as she spoke. Dudley chuckled, for a short girl, she seemed to have an appetite to match Ron's. Indeed, she was even urging Ron to eat more as if he would suddenly start to waste away. Ron, Dudley noticed, was only too glad to obey.

"Better finish quick, we've got History of Magic in 10 minutes," said Dean.

Ron sighed. "Yippee!" he said, sarcastically.

"History isn't so bad," Cho said. "You just need to bring your own history book to class, then you can read the good bits by yourself—it's one of my top subjects."

"There are no good bits," Ron replied.

"Not the way Binns teaches it," Cho admitted. "But there's a lot of interesting stuff in the books. Did you know that the giants practiced cannibalism during the Giant Wars? They believed that eating the flesh of one's foe meant you grew stronger."

Ron slid his half-eaten bacon away, suddenly looking like he had lost his appetite.

Dudley was exempt from exams and had been spending most of them sat at the back of the class trying to read up on spells for the final task but largely failing to do so. He wasn't very good at self-study.

At that moment, Professor McGonagall came walking alongside the Gryffindor table toward him.

"Dursley, Longbottom, the champions are congregating in the chamber off the Hall after breakfast," she said.

"But the task's not till tonight!" said Dudley..

"I'm aware of that, Dursley," she said. "The champions' families are invited to watch the final task, you know. This is simply a chance for you to greet them."

"My mum and dad can't be here can they?" Dudley looked at Hermione.

"Muggles can't enter Hogwarts," she said, prompty. "It's all in …"

"Hogwarts a History," Ron finished. "So who's come for Dudley?"

"Lockhart I expect," said Dudley.

"Or Ron's family," Hermione said.

Ron suddenly looked pleased. "That's just like mum. Wish I could skive History."

Hermione gave him a sharp look.

"I suppose I best go to see," Dudley said. He gave Luna a goodbye kiss and stood up. Neville joined him.

"It'll be your Gran?" Dudley asked, as they walked out together.

"Yeah, maybe Uncle Algie, too,"

"Cool," Dudley had heard stories about Uncle Algie and he sounded like good fun. He knew he had once pushed Dudley off Blackpool Pier and hung him out of his bedroom by his ankles to force magic out of him.

Inside the entrance hall was Neville's grandmother who was a tall, stern looking witch wearing a hat with a stuffed vulture on it. Accompanying her was a short, fat little man with a bushy moustache to rival Vernon's wearing a pork pie hat and checkered robes which in Dudley's opinion made him look like a chess board.

"Neville, my boy!" he greeted, seizing him in a tight hug.

Also in the room was Viktor Krum with his family, conversing in Bulgarian. Fleur was there with her parents and her sister, Gabrielle, and there, at the back, were Mrs. Weasley and Bill. Hermione had been right.

"Surprise!" Mrs. Weasley said excitedly as he smiled broadly and walked over to them. "Thought we'd come and watch you. Dudley!" She bent down and kissed him on the cheek.

"You all right?" said Bill, grinning at Dudley and shaking his hand. "Charlie wanted to come, but he couldn't get time off. He told us all about the Short-Snout."

"Charlie was brilliant, you should have seen it," Dudley said.

"He's always been a good wizard, our Charlie," said Bill.

Fleur Delacour, Dudley noticed, was eying Bill over her mum's shoulder.

"I'm glad you're here, I thought at first my parents had come," he said.

"I'm sure they would have," said Mrs. Weasley. "But muggles can't get inside Hogwarts. So, Bill and I thought we'd show our support."

"Cheers," said Dudley, feeling strangely touched at the support from Ron's family.

"It's great being back here," said Bill, looking around the chamber (Violet, the Fat Lady's friend, winked at him from her frame). "Haven't seen this place for five years. Is that picture of the mad knight still around? Sir Cadogan?"

"Oh yeah," said Dudley, who had met Sir Cadogan the previous year.

"And the Fat Lady?" said Bill.

"She was here in my time," said Mrs. Weasley. "She gave me such a telling off one night when I got back to the dormitory at four in the morning -"

"What were you doing out of your dormitory at four in the morning?" said Bill, surveying his mother with amazement.

Mrs. Weasley grinned, her eyes twinkling.

"Your father and I had been for a nighttime stroll," she said. "He got caught by Apollyon Pringle - he was the caretaker in those days - your father's still got the marks."

"Fancy giving us a tour, Dudley?" said Bill.

"Yeah, okay," said Dudley, and they made their way back toward the door into the Great Hall.

As they reached the door, Neville's grandmother stepped forward. "You must be Dudley Dursley," she said, offering her hand. Dudley shook it. Algie was standing next to her and gave Dudley a grin and a wink.

"Neville has told me all about you, and Mrs. Weasley, we met once before," she turned to the Weasleys and shook hands with them, too before turning back to Dudley.

Neville, Dudley saw, was hanging back, looking a little embarrassed.

"He told me you used to bully him dreadfully," she said, suddenly sounding as severe as Professor McGonagall.

"Yeah … well …" Dudley looked down at his feet, suddenly feeling awkward. Mrs. Longbottom was a very intimidating witch.

"But …" her voice softened. "He also told me you encouraged him to stand up for himself. It's perhaps the push he needed. He is a good boy, but always struggled with confidence …"
she gave Neville a glance.

"But look at him now, one of the Hogwarts Champions and even in the lead. He's finally doing his parents proud," she said approvingly. "I'm sure t's going to be an excellent final, and I wish you all the best, Dudley."

She offered her hand again and Dudley shook it.

Now, Algie stepped forward. "Uncle Algie," he said, offering a fat hand to Dudley. "Hope you haven't been leading my nephew into mischief?" he said, but grinned when he said it.

"Not too much," Dudley said. "Nev, kinda, stops us all from crossing the line."

Algie let out a peculiar bark of a laugh.

"That's not what I hear! You've gotten into more hijinks than any other student, I bet—why, I bet even you and Minerva didn't have the knack of getting into trouble that Dudley does," Algie said with a cheeky glance at Augusta Longbottom.

"That was a long time ago," she said, icily. "And I, unlike some, matured with age," she said with a meaningful look at Algie.

"Augusta and Minerva were the big troublemakers of their day, the terrible two they use to call them," Algie said with another grin. "They discovered everything there is to know about the castle during their time, and the amount of times they went into the Forbidden Forest … I remember our mother sending Augusta a howler …"

"I think we're keeping Dudley and the Weasleys, Algernon," Augusta said. "Dudley, good luck for the task."

Dudley knew he was been dismissed so said his goodbyes. Algie gave another mischievous grin.

Dudley had a very enjoyable morning walking over the sunny grounds with Bill and Mrs. Weasley, showing them the Beauxbatons carriage and the Durmstrang ship. Mrs. Weasley was intrigued by the Whomping Willow, which had been planted after she had left school, and reminisced at length about the gamekeeper before Hagrid, a man called Ogg.

"How's Percy?" Dudley asked as they walked around the greenhouses.

"Not good," said Bill.

"He's very upset," said Mrs. Weasley, lowering her voice and glancing around. "The Ministry wants to keep Mr. Crouch's disappearance quiet, but Percy's been hauled in for questioning about the instructions Mr. Crouch has been sending in. They seem to think there's a chance they weren't genuinely written by him. Percy's been under a lot of strain. They're not letting him fill in for Mr. Crouch as the fifth judge tonight. Cornelius Fudge is going to be doing it."

They returned to the castle for lunch.

"Mum - Bill!" said Ron, as he joined the Gryffindor table. "Hermione's guessed it was you."

"She was right!" said Mrs. Weasley brightly. "I must say, it makes a lovely change, not having to cook. How was your exam?"

"Oh...okay," said Ron. "Couldn't remember all the goblin rebels' names, so I invented a few. It's all right," he said, helping himself to a Cornish pasty, while Mrs. Weasley looked stern, "they're all called stuff like Bodrod the Bearded and Urg the Unclean; it wasn't hard."

Fred, George, and Ginny came to sit next to them too, and Dudley was having such a good time he felt almost as though he were back at the Burrow; he had forgotten to worry about that evening's task.

Dudley, Bill, and Mrs. Weasley whiled away the afternoon with a long walk around the castle, and then returned to the Great Hall for the evening feast. Ludo Bagman and Cornelius Fudge had joined the staff table now. Bagman looked quite cheerful, but Cornelius Fudge, who was sitting next to Madame Maxime, looked stern and was not talking. Madame Maxime was concentrating on her plate, and Dudley thought her eyes looked red. Hagrid kept glancing along the table at her for some unknown reason.

There were more courses than usual, but Dudley, who was starting to feel really nervous now, didn't eat much. As the enchanted ceiling overhead began to fade from blue to a dusky purple, Dumbledore rose to his feet at the staff table, and silence fell.

"Ladies and gentlemen, in five minutes' time, I will be asking you to make your way down to the Quidditch field for the third and final task of the Triwizard Tournament. Will the champions please follow Mr. Bagman down to the stadium now."