Going Under

A week had passed since the day of the second task and much had happened in that time. Sirius had asked Harry to meet up in Hogsmeade for a talk and Ron, Hermione and himself had gone to see his godfather for a long and interesting conversation about the tournament, death eaters and more specifically, Barty Crouch.

It was nice. Outside of Professor Moody, it really felt like no one was taking the 'entered against his will, most likely by a powerful dark wizard that had somehow gotten into the school' thing very seriously. Harry had quickly come to like that about Sirius; he was an adult that cared yet never treated Harry like a naive child or a foolish student.

Still he worried, Sirius was holed up in a cave on the outskirts of the village feasting on rats and Hogsmeade was far too risky of a place for a wanted criminal to be wandering about, even transformed into a dog. Not to mention that he'd flown there using Buckbeak and trying to provide enough to eat for the both of them would be a challenge. Harry had vowed to send as much extra food as he could to the man.

Then there was the recurring headache named Rita Skeeter. The woman had spent the year steadily climbing the ranks in Harry's list of people he really didn't like and after her most recent article, was threatening to overtake Draco Malfoy's spot at third. Just below Snape at second and, of course, Voldemort at number one.

Pansy Parkinson had practically thrown the newest edition of Witch Weekly into Hermione's face during a double block of potions. It seemed Ron was right and that Hermione's spat with the reporter in the Three Broomsticks had ended in Skeeter seeking revenge in the form of libel, insinuating in the piece that Hermione was his girlfriend and that she'd been dosing both Viktor Krum and himself with love potions.

Hermione hadn't been bothered much by the accusations, practically laughing in the face of anyone that asked her about its validity, until she'd started getting some very nasty letters from people thinking they were defending the honour of the boy-who-lived. After a visit to the hospital wing due to one of the letters being laced with bubotuber pus, Hermione had angrily declared her campaign to expose Rita Skeeter as a fraud.

Normally Harry would've left his bushy-haired friend to her own devices, he had enough on his plate as it was and a determined Hermione Granger was difficult to keep up with, but his friend hadn't been the only one attacked in the article.

It'd been titled; Harry Potter's Scandalous Love Life, and after she'd finished lambasting Hermione, Skeeter had gone on to share the details of his interaction with Gabrielle.

However, Miss Granger may not be the only one seeking the affections of the boy-who-lived. During the second task of the Triwizard Tournament each champion was assigned a 'hostage' to retrieve from the bottom of the Black Lake. Beauxbatons champion, a witch named Fleur Delacour, was attacked by Grindylows and failed to rescue her 13 year old sister Gabrielle Delacour.

Despite Mr Potter arriving first to the location of the hostages he chose not to immediately return to the surface and no doubt secure first place in the event. Instead the boy spent extra time to rescue the younger Miss Delacour as well and completed the task after the time limit for the event had already run out. The choice to do so was explained by the judges as proof of his good character, however this reporter thinks there might be something more sinister going on.

Some digging has revealed that both the Delacour sisters are in fact a quarter-Veela through their grandmother. For those that don't know, Veela are magical beings common in countries like Bulgaria and France who are typically seen as beautiful women, but are in fact capable of transforming into dangerous bird-like creatures known for using their powers to control and manipulate men to do their bidding.

One can't help but wonder if these girls used their magical abilities to not only manipulate Mr Potter into giving up a first place finish, but for whatever malicious purposes also attempted to ensnare his heart, evidenced by Miss Gabrielle Delacour very graciously thanking her rescuer with a kiss.

Harry had stopped reading after that, thoroughly disgusted. Skeeter was attempting to do the same thing to Fleur and Gabrielle as she'd done to Hagrid. Make a big deal of their status as quarter-Veela and make dark insinuations about them as people based on their heritage. Harry feared that it would work, the reactions Hermione and Hagrid had received proved that it was a valid fear.

He'd been thinking about Gabrielle a lot since the task, despite not seeing her a single time. He'd seen Fleur plenty at meals but never her younger sister and Hermione had theorised that the girl had only been brought to Hogwarts to be a hostage since all the other Beauxbatons students at Hogwarts were those old enough to have participated in the tournament. His friend was probably right, considering he'd never seen her before the task either.

He couldn't help but feel disappointed at the thought that he might never see her again. Even with their interaction being limited to those few minutes at the lake he'd felt a bizarre connection with the French girl. He'd wondered if his reaction to Gabrielle had been due to her being part-Veela, but after thinking about the World Cup more and taking several long looks at Fleur from across the room he completely ruled that out.

It had been something about Gabrielle specifically that had evoked that feeling in him and not understanding what that meant was truly bothering him.

So toward the end of dinner the next night, Harry approached the Ravenclaw table where the Beauxbatons students often sat. Cho was the first to notice him.

"Hi, Harry." She greeted, which prompted several heads to turn to him, including Fleur's.

"Hey." He said, not risking any more words to Cho lest he make a fool of himself again. Instead he focused his attention on his fellow champion. "Mind talking for a minute?"

Fleur raised an eyebrow but nodded and made room for him to sit, which he did after hesitating for a moment. Had he ever sat anywhere but the Gryffindor table since arriving at Hogwarts? Was he even allowed to? He glanced up at the staff table but all of them seemed too engrossed in their own conversations to pay him much mind.

He decided to go for it and sat down, a glass of pumpkin juice popping into existence the instant his bum touched the seat.

"Did you read the Witch Weekly article?" He asked. Fleur tensed and narrowed her eyes at him.

"I did. I'm not sure what they teach about Veela here but—" Harry shook his head and cut her off.

"I don't know much about Veela outside of the basics, but I don't think either of you are trying to manipulate me or anything." He said and that seemed to be enough for Fleur to relax again.

"Not that it would work anyway. Harry broke out of the Imperious curse in Defence class." Terry Boot cut in from down the table. Harry and Fleur both stared at him for a few seconds. "Uh…sorry, I just heard it from Dean the other day." Terry then awkwardly went back to his dinner.

"Is that true? I wouldn't think a professor should be casting such things on a student." Fleur asked.

"He was showing them to us so we would know what to do if we encountered someone using them. And it's kind of true. It was more like I managed to stop myself from doing what he asked me to, for the most part I was still under the curse." Even with his downplaying Fleur still looked impressed.

"Anyway, I came to warn you. Hermione got some really nasty letters sent to her because of that article and one of them had bubotuber pus in it, she had to spend half the day in the hospital wing because of it."

Fleur shook her head. "Anything sent to me goes to the carriages and it's warded to warn Madame Maxime if anything dangerous is delivered. She did have to dispose of some, but I never saw them."

Harry wondered why Hogwarts didn't do the same thing. Wards like those could have prevented situations like the one with his Firebolt and maybe even Riddle's diary from happening.

"What about Gabrielle, the article named her. Does Beauxbatons have the same wards?" Harry asked. Fleur frowned.

"It does, but I should warn her and our parents about this anyway. Something could get sent to our house and cause a problem." That confirmed that Gabrielle was back in France. Harry flaked the glass of juice in annoyance.

Fleur then cleared her throat and when he looked at her she met his eyes. "I want to apologise to you Harry."

"Er...really? What for?"

"I judged you too quickly. You are young, but are clearly a capable wizard, I should not have said bad things about you." She said, Harry shrugged.

"Thanks, but I feel like I've mostly been getting absurdly lucky." Fleur narrowed her eyes at him.

"Attributing your success only to luck makes those who compete against you look bad, you know."

"Right, sorry."

"I also want to say that I believe that you did not enter yourself." Fleur said and Harry's face must have shown his surprise because she quickly elaborated. "You mentioned at the lake that this may not be the first time bad things have happened to you at Hogwarts so I asked around. Plenty of people seem to think that you seek out trouble, but I think that trouble often finds you instead, hmm?"

"Trouble has been finding me since I was born." Harry agreed quietly. Fleur's eyes flicked to Harry's scar for a moment letting him know that she'd understood what he'd meant. Things were silent for a minute after and Harry wondered if he should head back to Gryffindor's table.

"Gabrielle is quite enamoured with you." Fleur stated casually. Harry choked on the pumpkin juice he'd just taken a large sip from and Fleur laughed, reaching over and patting him lightly on the back.

"Don't act so shocked." She said once he'd recovered. "She kissed you after all."

Harry frantically looked around and noticed that many people had quieted down and were suddenly very interested in hearing what was the conversation between himself and Fleur.

"On the cheek." He clarified, wishing she hadn't started talking about this in front of a bunch of other students. "I thought she was just…you know…thanking me for helping her?"

"She was. But she also didn't stop talking about you for the rest of the day, not to mention the letters she sent me asking about you since she went home." Harry's ears went pink and Fleur smiled in amusement.

"Would she want you to tell me this?" Harry asked, desperate for her to stop giving the Hogwarts rumour mill more ammunition. Already he could see that Cho and her friend Marrietta had stuck their heads together and were whispering and giggling while glancing at him.

"No. But if I told her that I asked you if she could send you a letter and you said yes, I'm certain she would forgive me." Fleur said. Harry's jaw dropped; Fleur may just be the most bold witch he'd ever met.

"I…I guess that would be fine." Harry said. No matter how flustered the public setting of this conversation was making him, he couldn't deny that just earlier today he had been lamenting the thought of never seeing Gabrielle again.

"Excellent. I'll write to her tonight and let her know."

Harry nodded dumbly and quickly excused himself from the table and walked back to his own. That had to be the most mortifying conversation he'd ever stumbled his way into. He sat back down between Ron and Hermione, who immediately asked him how it went, he explained his conversation to Fleur with her but left out any mention of Gabrielle. For all he knew Fleur could've just been teasing him and his quota for being publicly embarrassed was completely full for the year.

(break)

Just two days later a grey owl dropped a letter down in front of him at breakfast. It only had his name written in elegant cursive on the front but the wax seal of the Beauxbatons crest on the back confirmed who it was from.

Ron and Hermione tried to take a look at it, but Harry managed to hide it away in his bag quickly enough that Ron didn't even notice, being so absorbed in his food. Hermione seemed curious until a hastily crafted question about their most recent transfiguration essay distracted her until they needed to head to their morning classes and by the time lunch came around it had slipped her mind.

A nervous anticipation filled him for the day and once he finally returned to the common room he ran up the stairs and lept into bed, closing the curtain around him for some ensured privacy before swiftly casting lumos and opening the letter.

Dear Harry,

First I want to say that I'm very sorry about Fleur. I'm writing this after I just finished yelling at her through the floo for embarrassing me. Then I thanked her because I am very happy you said yes.

Thank you again for rescuing me from the lake, even if I was safe. It was sweet and it meant a lot to me and my sister. My parents are both furious by the way, since neither Hogwarts nor Beauxbatons contacted them to get consent for my participation in the task and have told me I'm not to say yes to anything of the sort ever again without asking them first.

Fleur also told me that you were concerned for my well being after an article that was published in a magazine? It wasn't published in France and I haven't read it but apparently it said some terrible things about Veela and I'm happy you didn't believe any of it. Thank you for looking out for us but I haven't received anything bad. Maybe the British magicals found it too much of a hassle to send their owls so far?

My classmates have teased me a bit about the task; a magical French newspaper covered the event and mentioned how I kissed your cheek. I didn't realise it would be so notable, sorry if it's caused you any trouble.

I realise we don't really know much about each other outside of what I've read about you in books, if any of that is true. Maybe we can introduce ourselves here? Tell eachother a bit about ourselves?

My full name is Gabrielle Élise Delacour and I'm attending my third year at Beauxbatons and my favourite class is Magizoology, though I think Hogwarts may call it something different? I love magical creatures and our family has bred Abraxans, a type of magic winged horse for generations; you probably already saw them pulling the carriages.

My father wants Fleur and I to continue the family business, but I know Fleur hates the idea. I wouldn't mind though, I like magic but nothing in my classes so far have really interested me in pursuing it past school but maybe that will change.

Do you have a favourite class? I'd love to hear about it! Thank you for agreeing to this even if my sister embarrassed us both while asking.

Sincerely, Gabrielle

Harry smiled to himself after he finished reading. Her writing was casual and inquisitive, like something he would get from a friend. Fleur had said Gabrielle was 'enamoured' with him and he'd worried that it would read like Ginny's valentine to him back in his second year; somewhat sweet but mostly creepy.

He peeked out of his curtains and confirmed that he was still alone in the dormitory before getting out of bed and digging his writing equipment from his bag.

Dear Gabrielle,

Don't worry about Fleur, it was a bit embarrassing but I'm happy to exchange letters with you. At least she asked me while we were at the Ravenclaw table, all of my friends in Gryffindor would have teased me about it too, especially Fred and George; they're twins and the older brothers of my best mate Ron, the boy who I was actually supposed to save in the second task.

I'm not surprised that Hogwarts didn't contact your parents. I'm not sure about Beauxbatons but things here often feel like the first step that should be taken is the last thing that gets done. Did you see much of the castle while you were here? I remember when I first saw it I thought it was the most incredible thing I'd ever seen. I have no idea what Beauxbatons looks like, is it big? I imagine it's much warmer there, being in France and all.

I'm glad you didn't read the article, it was a nasty piece written by an even nastier woman named Rita Skeeter. She's been writing terrible things about my friends and I since it was announced that I was participating in the tournament and it's good to hear that nothing bad happened to you. My friend Hermione received bubotuber pus in the mail because of it.

Introducing ourselves sounds like a good idea, I've only gotten to do it a handful of times since, unfortunately, most people know who I am before meeting me.

My name is Harry James Potter and I'm in my fourth year at Hogwarts in Gryffindor house. I notice you didn't mention a house or anything of the sort, does Beauxbatons have any? Magizoology is called Care of Magical Creatures here, a bit of a mouthful I know and it's probably my favourite class as well. I would say it's Defence Against the Dark Arts, another mouthful, if Professor Lupin was still teaching it, but he got replaced this year. In fact the DADA teacher changes every single year at Hogwarts, a lot of people say the position is cursed.

Hagrid teaches Care of Magical Creatures and he's a very good friend of mine so we always have fun in his class, even if it can be a bit dangerous at times. He actually bred something called a Blast-Ended Skrewt which is a hybrid between a fire crab and a manticore. He thinks they're harmless but he thought a bunch of angry dragons were harmless too.

I did see the Abraxans, they were very nice looking. Can you ride them? I flew on the back of a Hippogriff last year in class and it was fun though a bit uncomfortable and scary. I think I definitely prefer a broom.

I haven't the slightest clue what I want to do after school, I don't really know about a lot of magical jobs available to me. Professor Moody asked me if I was interested in being an Auror once, I'm not sure about it myself and Ron reckons I should just stick to flying.

I enjoyed your letter and writing this one, so please send another.

Sincerely, Harry

He sealed it up and sent it off with Hedwig the next morning. The owl had actually looked excited when he told her that he wanted her to fly all the way to France and had taken flight immediately.

Harry spent the next couple days eagerly waiting for her to return and one morning Hedwig swooped down during breakfast and dropped Gabrielle's next letter into his hands proudly. He gave her two whole strips of bacon as a reward and again he tucked the letter away before anyone could get a good look at it.

Unfortunately, Hermione had been impossible to distract a second time. She was worried that he'd used Hedwig to communicate with Sirius - he'd recommended during their conversation in Hogsmeade to not use his owl with him since she would attract too much attention - and Harry assured her that wasn't the case but she'd spent the rest of the day pestering him about who he was corresponding with, only backing off when she realised Harry would be staying tight lipped on the subject.

That night Harry had again headed straight up to the boys dormitories without delay, pointedly ignoring the look of burning curiosity from Hermione. Gabrielle's response was significantly lengthier than her first letter and he read through it with a single minded focus that would have shocked his teachers.

She began the letter by gushing over Hedwig, calling her the most gorgeous owl she'd ever seen. According to her, all of her Beauxbatons friends had fawned over Hedwig and spent their mornings feeding the owl bits of their breakfast.

After drowning his snowy in praise, she wrote about how happy she was that the two of them had found something in common so quickly with their enjoyment of Care of Magical Creatures. She then went into a lengthy explanation of Beauxbatons and its many differences to Hogwarts.

The school was a palace in southern France and the weather was indeed much warmer than that of the Scottish Highlands. They were not separated into different houses or anything of the sort. I think there is enough drama between students as is without directly pitting them against each other, she'd written.

Harry wondered how his experience at Hogwarts would have changed if there were no houses. Perhaps problems like his constant clashing with the Slytherins would be less significant, though he imagined that Draco Malfoy would find a way to be an annoying prat no matter the circumstances. Quidditch would certainly be significantly less competitive; Harry enjoyed playing the game more than he did winning the game but there was a natural high that came from his housemates' passionate celebrations after a victory.

She expressed interest in learning more about the Blast-Ended-Skrewts and especially in his experience with riding Buckbeak. Apparently, Hippogriffs aren't native to France so she'd never seen one but they were a favourite of hers and she hoped to encounter one someday. Then she mentioned Rita Skeeter.

My mother was furious when Fleur sent her a copy of the magazine you spoke of and told me that she was going to contact one of her friends in the French ministry about taking legal action.

Harry grinned, Hermione would be thrilled to hear that tidbit and Skeeter deserved to be hit with far worse than a lawsuit.

Gabrielle then continued their bit of introductions from before and listed several facts about herself from her favourite colour being purple to her love of a French dish called Soupe à l'oignon and finished out her letter expressing her hopes for a swift reply also requesting that he send it along with Hedwig again.

He happily spent the rest of his time before bed putting quill to parchment.

That didn't take as long as I thought it would, I usually don't manage to find the inspiration to write again so quickly. I debated having Gabrielle stay at Hogwarts post second task but it didn't seem very realistic even with her being older. Don't worry though, the two of them will be doing much more than exchanging letters in this story.

Sucks that Christmas and the Yule Ball came before Gabrielle's introduction, I could've had some fun with that. Regardless, I seem to have found a bit of a muse for this story and already have started making progress on a third chapter. I have a road trip coming up soon (18 hours, yikes!) so I'll certainly have the opportunity to get more writing done.

Feel free to share your thoughts on the chapter, negative or positive. I'm doing this as a hobby but I do want to get better as well.

- Waid h