Chapter Seven: The Astronomy Tower

The Astronomy tower was cool and silver, bathed in the silent light of the moon. Beth and Bruce clambered up through the trap-door and carefully closed it again before moving a heavy astrolabe to block the entrance. It would not do to be caught.

Above, vast eons of stars arched over the turrets of Hogwarts and the dense top of the Forbidden Forest; constellations shimmered and the tiny moons of other planets caught that twinkle and disappeared. Bruce wasn't interested in the heavens. He was training a large brass telescope on the far end of the Hogwarts grounds, past the lake.

"What part of the lake did you say?" Beth whispered, focusing a smaller, hand-held collapsible telescope on the trees in the Forbidden Forest. She sort of hoped to glimpse a centaur again.

"Past the far bank. About ... two o'clock." He adjusted the angle of the telescope and squinted through the eyepiece. Bruce had never mastered the art of looking through a telescope with both eyes open. "Maybe three o'clock ...." He twiddled with the focus. "There! Yes, there's something ... maybe about two-thirty for you ..."

Beth tried to aim her telescope in the direction that Bruce pointed. Though the night was clear, the grounds were pitch-black. She could only make out the eerie glow from the Durmstrang ship's ports, the warm shimmer of the Beauxbatons carriage, and a cozy light from the windows of Hagrid's hut. Other than that, the moon skipped over smaller features, brushing against the lake, glinting from the eyes of some animal, flirting with the branches of the Whomping Willow ...

A column of fire shattered the sky.

"Did you see that!" said Bruce excitedly, accidentally bumping his telescope. He hurried to refocus. "Right where I said! I knew there was something there!"

Beth steadied the telescope against her shaking fingers. "But what was it?"

A second shriek of fire -- this one tighter, sky-blue in color -- flamed up and died out, leaving the forest even darker than before.

"I can't tell ..." Bruce muttered, peering harder through his telescope. "If only it would stay lit ..."

Two of the bonfires flared up at once. In the light that they cast off, Beth could make out a silhouette heaving up between them, dark and sinuous, glinting and enormous, strange and mythical and yet very, very real.

"It's a dragon!" she blurted.

"Not just one!" cried Bruce, exhilarated to see such a mighty beast, even from afar. "It's a bunch of dragons! Look, you can see it through mine ..."

Beth dropped her telescope and hurried over to share an eyepiece with Bruce. He had adjusted it to collect enough light to see by; around the entrancing dragons, she could make out a wooden fence and several scurrying creatures -- people? they looked so small -- darting in between the scaly beasts. Once in a while, a screeching roar would tear over the forest, so wild and fierce that it made Beth's heart leap to hear it. These creatures would fight for their freedom. They would die for it.

There was a very faint shout from the paddock. One by one, the great monsters swayed and fell to the ground. The thud echoed across the grounds and the quaking gradually subsided.

Bruce stood up from the telescope. He still looked a little stunned. "Dragons," he breathed. "They were enormous, did you see?"

"Did you feel it when they fell?" said Beth. "It was like an earthquake ..."

They looked at each other, both amazed and awed ... then, at the same time, they spoke.

"We've got to tell Diggory."

***

It was agreed that only the two of them would approach Diggory about the dragons.

"What's he going to think," said Bruce at breakfast the next morning, "if he's suddenly flocked by a dozen of us telling him there are dragons across the lake?"

"That he's being attacked," said Beth. She lathered her bagel with strawberry jam. "And that we're having him on, probably." She caught sight of Diggory and dropped her bagel. "He's leaving! Come on --"

They caught up with Diggory and some of his friends at the top of the marble staircase. Bruce reached out and caught Diggory's shoulder before he could get too far down the Charms corridor. "Diggory -- can we see you for a second?"

"You just did," sneered Stebbins.

Diggory cast him a reproving glance. "Sure," he told Bruce, and the three of them moved to the side of the hall. Diggory put his hands on his hips. "Well?"

Beth and Bruce exchanged glances; then Beth took a breath.

"The first task is dragons."

Diggory looked at them blankly, then a sort of bemused anger settled over his face. "You followed me up here just to feed me a line like that?"

"It's true," Beth said, almost annoyed. She hadn't expected him to disbelieve them quite so thoroughly. "There are all these dragons across the lake. We're pretty sure you have to kill one for the first task."

"I have to kill a dragon," repeated Diggory, obviously without believing a word of it. He looked from one to the other. "So why are you telling me?"

There was a pause. Then Bruce said, "Well, who wants Potter to win?"

Diggory's face grew even more skeptical.

"We know about the Transcongus Brew," Beth said suddenly, throwing caution to the wind. "I don't think you realize that you could actually die --"

Diggory's eyes flickered to Beth's face; then he shook his head. "Nice try, but it's not going to work," he said. "I've got to get to class." He hauled his bookbag onto one shoulder and left.

There was a long pause.

"So let him get eaten or fried," said Bruce. "We did our best."

Beth gazed down the hall to where Diggory had rejoined some of his friends. He had taken no more than two steps when his bag split a seam and his whole stash of books came tumbling into the middle of the emptying hall. Beth turned around in time to see Potter far at the other end of the corridor, stuffing his wand back into his robes.

"Go on," she said slowly. "I'll be there in a minute. Something's going on ..."

She walked with Bruce until they were past Diggory, telling his friends in an exasperated tone to warn Flitwick he'd be late. Beth ducked behind a suit of armor (who chuckled hollowly until she elbowed it in the breastplate) and waited until the halls were clear.

She didn't have to wait long. The silence was broken almost immediately by quick footsteps that stopped around the place Diggory stood.

"Hi," came Diggory's voice, muffled by the fact that he was bending over to pick up his scattered books. "My bag just split ... brand-new and all ..."

"Cedric," said Potter, "the first task is dragons."

It was the last thing Beth expected him to say. Aha, she thought, someone else has been sneaking around the grounds. She remembered that Potter had an Invisibility Cloak -- they had found it laying on the floor of a secret passage the previous year -- and mentally vowed to keep an ear open for suspicious noises whenever she went out at night.

"What?" This was Cedric. He sounded unnerved.

"Dragons. They've got four, one for each of us, and we've got to get past them," Potter said quickly.

There was a pause. Then Cedric, slightly panicky: "Are you sure?"

Potter swore that it was true.

"But how did you find out? We're not supposed to know --"

Don't begrudge a hint, Beth thought irritably. Honorable people could put themselves in a lot of danger for no real reason.

"Never mind ... but I'm not the only one that knows," Potter added. "Fleur and Krum will know by now -- Maxime and Karkaroff both saw the dragons too."

Karkaroff too? thought Beth. Just how many people had been hanging around the paddock that night?!?

There was a rustling noise (Diggory collecting his books, no doubt) that lengthened into a pause. Then Diggory said one more thing.

"Why are you telling me?"

He definitely sounded suspicious -- and it may have been Beth's imagination, but he seemed a little bewildered too. Potter was equally surprised.

"It's just .... fair, isn't it? We all know now ... we're on an even footing now, aren't we?"

The silence was broken by clunking, uneven footsteps. Then Professor Moody's gruff voice: "Come with me, Potter. Diggory, off you go."

Beth waited until she could hear Moody clomping away before she darted out from behind the statue and hurried after Diggory. She caught up with him just outside the Charms classroom. She grabbed his arm and he spun around nervously. His eyes were a little bit fevered, as if the thought of battling a dragon had very suddenly hit home.

"Believe us now?" she said, before he had a chance to speak.

"I don't know," he said angrily, and darted into Flitwick's class without another word.

***

Beth had a free period that morning, so she darted down the library to work on her final project. She was standing amid the biology section, flipping through a book called Magical Vision, when she heard an astonished whisper from the next aisle over.

"Dragons?"

She stopped short.

"Shhh, yes, yes, I'm sure of it! I don't know how the whole school found out and I didn't, but they all seemed sincere ..."

It was Cedric Diggory. Beth pulled a book at random and opened it, pressing herself against the shelves, listening as hard as she could.

"Well -- what are you going to do?" It was a girl's voice, edged in fear, with a certain resolve.

Diggory sighed. "I don't know yet. All I can think to do is distract it somehow. They're like fortresses, dragons ... takes a dozen guys to knock one out, remember what Kettleburn used to tell us?"

"Use something you're good at," the girl said urgently. "You've been doing well in Transfiguration."

Beth could hear the grin in Diggory's voice. "Thanks, Cho."

So the girl was Cho Chang, the little Ravenclaw Seeker. Beth made a mental note. She might be a way to get advice to Diggory indirectly.

"D'you want me to get my friends working on it? We've got loads of books in the common room --"

"No!" Diggory's voice was edgy. "I'm supposed to work it out myself ... thanks, though."

Cho sighed softly.

Beth tried hard to look like she was concentrating on the book in her hands. Why wouldn't Diggory just accept someone's help? If she had to fight a dragon, she'd be calling Mr. Scamander, Lycaeon, Dave Gudgeon, and the entire S.S.A. to help her figure out how. Better dishonor than death.

"Come on," said Diggory, calm and low. "Better death than dishonor."

And Beth knew what made their two houses so different.

***

At lunch, Beth told the Society what she had heard in the library.

"... and then he said, 'Death before dishonor' or something ... I don't think he'd let us help him even if he did believe us ..." Beth stopped talking and waved a hand in front of Richard's face. "Are you listening?"

Richard was sitting with his head propped on one fist, gazing down the table at Draco and his classmates. He spoke up thoughtfully. It was clear he hadn't heard a word Beth had said.

"Is it just me, or have the fourth-years been acting weird lately?"

Beth took a glance down the table. Draco, Crabbe and Goyle were huddled together sniggering about something. Pansy was poring over Witch Weekly's makeup section, while Blaise did her best to look interested and Millicent made sour comments about people who painted their faces. Morag chatted gaily with Oren Bergeron, who struggled dutifully to understand his dialect. "They're the fourth-years," said Mervin. "I'd be more worried if they started acting normal."

"It's a different kind of weird," said Richard. "Like they're all in on a secret." Indeed, now Pansy had abandoned her magazine to lean toward Draco, and they were both grinning in a devilish kind of way. "Remind me to grill Blaise and Morag on it later."

"They're probably just still proud of themselves for getting the Potter Stinks badges made," Melissa said dismissively.

"Maybe," said Richard, still watching the fourth-years closely.

"Anyway," said Beth loudly, "like I was saying, I don't know if Diggory will let us get him ready. Not that we have that much time ..."

"What -- oh, right, sorry," said Richard, turning to face her for the first time in the whole conversation. He frowned as the meaning of her words sank in. "Right. We have a day and a half ..." His gaze drifted to the Durmstrangers at the end of the table. "I wonder if Viktor knows?"

Beth paused. "That's not our business, Richard," she said at last.

"Still ..." He didn't seem to be looking at Viktor, but rather at Gypsy, as he spoke. "Wouldn't want him to die, either."

When the bell rang for classes, Rich hurried up to Gypsy with Beth, resigned, in his wake. He pulled the Durmstrang girl aside and lowered his voice conspiratorially. "Tell Viktor that the first task is dragons."

"Oh," said Gypsy. "Yes, thank you, but he already knows."

Richard blinked. "Really? How?"

"Karkaroff found out." Gypsy sighed. "Viktor didn't want to know, but now that he does he can't just ignore it. Been in the library all day. We ordered in some books from Durmstrang and I think they've given him a good idea of what to do." She smiled at Richard. "It was nice of you to think of him, though."

Richard blushed. Beth narrowed her eyes.

***

"So Krum knows," said Richard, when they met back in the common room after class. "That's good. It leaves us free to work on Diggory. I'll track him down; you tell everyone to start revising their Magical Creatures texts."

But Diggory was nowhere to be found.

Viktor Krum continued to stake out his corner of the library as if he were afraid it would be stolen if he left, and Potter was at least showing up for meals, but Cedric Diggory seemed to have dropped out of Hogwarts entirely. He skipped all his Monday afternoon classes, and didn't come down to dinner that night.

"If I didn't have to take finals, I'd be skipping class too," said Mervin gloomily.

"And I wouldn't be doing this stupid final project," said Beth. She had about had it with researching eyeballs and was ready to scrap the whole thing. "I'm going to the library -- anybody want to come along?"

"Are you crazy?" laughed Aaron Pucey.

"I will be soon," Beth sighed, and she headed off to study.

Not too many students were studying that evening, and by closing time the library was empty except for Beth, Viktor Krum, and a pair of Ravenclaws fervently copying a manuscript in ancient Babylonian symbols. At precisely nine o'clock, Madame Pince approached the Ravenclaws and ordered them to leave. They loaded their arms with scrolls and scurried out, muttering to each other in some other language that Beth couldn't even identify.

Madame Pince came up to Beth next. "Out you go," she said crisply. "These books will still be here in the morning."

Beth stretched and yawned. "Darn." She held up Light, Liberty and the Pursuit of Sight. "Can I just have a couple more minutes with this?"

"Oh, very well," sighed Madame Pince. "I'll go extract Mr. Krum -- but you must be gone by then. I have cataloguing to do." She cracked the ghost of a smile. "Mr. Krum has been in the Restricted Section all day. Goodness knows what that boy is after -- I shouldn't imagine there's much in the way of the Dark Arts here that Igor Karkaroff has not already taught them." She turned toward Krum's table -- and stopped. "Now where is that boy?"

Krum's things were still spread out across the table, but the student himself had disappeared. Madame Pince started off toward the Restricted Section to hunt him down. At the same time, Gypsy Arendt appeared in the doorway and headed toward Krum's table. She paused at the sight of Viktor's scattered textbooks. "Viktor?"

Viktor emerged from behind one of the shelves, holding what appeared to be the school copy of Quidditch Through the Ages. Gypsy glanced at the book; Viktor shrugged guiltily and set it down on a library cart.

"Pack up your things," said Gypsy. "You need to get back on the ship. Karkaroff wants you to get a good night's sleep --"

Viktor made a noise of contempt.

Gypsy sighed.

Viktor looked out the window. His low voice carried quite clearly across the deserted library. "I don't vant to do it."

"Don't be worried," said Gypsy kindly. "No dragon can be as tough as Ireland National Side."

"I'm not vorried," said Krum heatedly, "I don't vant to be here! I vish I was vith the Vultures, I miss Kvidditch, my teammates and my family --" He slumped into a chair dejectedly. "I vish the summer vould haff never ended."

Beth started to put away her books, very slowly and quietly. The library was turning into a pretty great place to eavesdrop. She didn't want to leave just yet.

Gypsy and Viktor spoke in low undertones for a few seconds; then Viktor raised his voice again.

"It's vorthless, he just vanted us to do it for his own glory --"

"It's for Durmstrang. The honor of the school."

Viktor muttered something inaudible.

"Yes, Karkaroff will get some of the credit," Gypsy said patiently. "You'll have to live with that. But five hundred years from now, when the Triwizard Cup is still on display, it won't say that the Tournament was won under Karkaroff." She paused. "It will say that it was won by Viktor Krum, of Durmstrang Academy. No one will know Karkaroff was there."

Viktor spoke up then, very clearly, very curt.

"I vish he vasn't."

~~~~~~~~
My only notes have to do with reader reviews.
First: Twenty points and a rousing round of applause to Moria, who answered the troll-hag-and-leprechaun joke challenge with something that was actually funny. Check it out in the reviews, and go drop her a line if you like it too.
Netrat sent in nitpicks. I love nitpicks. The answers are:
a) Luke didn't actually graduate from Hogwarts, but you can't lose your S.S.A. membership, so he's still in the club -- and since he's essentially a grownup, that puts him in the alumni chapter. I use the word "alumnus" loosely, to mean "somebody who used to be at Hogwarts" -- like Hagrid, or like this football player who went to my school, left without a degree to play pro, and still got the football field named after him the next homecoming.
b) Mr. Weasley went to Azkaban once, so I assume it's possible. (You have a very very good point, though ...) Also, Slytherins tend to be pureblood and powerful and/or wealthy -- there's noplace you can't get with enough Galleons.
c) The name Evan Rosier is Canon. (pg 589, GoF)
d) The date over the names on the wall of the crypt is their year of induction. I just stort of guesstimated an induction date for Wilkes and Rosier. By your calculations, they would've been inducted in 1972, not far from my guess of 1969. Let's call that even until JKR gives us more exact numbers. :-)
Two notes to Springrain. First, don't think I'm sitting here cranking out 10,000 words a night -- I'm not Stephen King! The story's already finished. It's just taken this long to edit, format and post. Second, I think they did explain about the Transcongus Brew to Gypsy: "Quickly [Richard] described the situation" keeps all you people from having to hear about it again. Now get to work on your finals! You can come back and read this anytime until June 20th at midnight!