Chapter 11 – Broken Mirrors / Into the Maelstrom
Over the few weeks left in September, and in the run up to October and Hallowe'en, Harry – as much as was possible, anyway – ignored his lessons in favour of near-religious flying and duelling practise. He attended each lesson and did his homework dutifully, of course, but all his spare time Harry dedicated to improving his wandwork and broom handling.
It was a habit mirrored by many of his peers, both in and out of his own House, and even by students in the upper years. Of course, many of the upper years – third and fifth years especially – had Ministry exams to sit at the end of the year, so they were perhaps not quite as consumed by Triwizard practise as the others. Still, it was becoming increasingly difficult to find anywhere good to fly that wasn't already swarming with students looking to do the same thing.
Even out of the way places within the castle were filled with students working on their wand handling – in direct contravention of several school rules. The teachers by and large turned a blind eye to it so long as nobody caused damage to the castle or themselves, as although students weren't technically supposed to be using magic in out of the way bits of the castle without supervision, everyone wanted Hogwarts to do well in the competition.
The Hufflepuffs, as they usually did, mostly trained together and in quite large groups, which meant they took up most of the larger disused rooms in the castle. The Gryffindors and Ravenclaws were much more varied in their haunts, but the Gryffindors at least seemed not to mind practising right out in the middle of everyone – on the lawns in front of the castle, or at the side of the lake, or in one particularly bold example, the library. That hadn't lasted long before Madam Pince banned the culprits for the foreseeable future, but that they'd even tried was impressive to Harry.
True to form, most of the Slytherins had snuck away to find secret spaces to practise their duelling alone, in pairs, or at most, threes. Most chose out-of-the-way alcoves in the dungeons, forgotten passageways on more or less empty floors or dusty old towers that hadn't seen a living soul in centuries. Harry himself had found a disused dungeon chamber in the lower recesses of the castle, although he did worry that it was too close to someone else's hidden training area, as he kept hearing whispers and snatches of sentences in the lulls of his own training.
"So hungry…" Harry heard as he rested in between attempts to pull off the trickier of the spell sequences Flitwick and Snape had drilled them in. "Must wait…"
"God, you'd think whoever it was down there would be quieter so no one else found their spot," muttered Harry to himself. What was the point of a secret training place if whoever used it shouted loud enough for someone else to hear?
He'd considered asking one of his friends to come train with him, especially in light of the pairs duelling, but he hadn't been able to decide which of them to ask. Ernie would probably be inundated with offers from his friends in Hufflepuff, and that was if they hadn't already sorted themselves into pairs – which meant Justin and Susan would likely be unavailable, too. Harry had thought about asking Theodore, who was great at picking up spells quickly, but the other boy sometimes froze mid-duel and that seemed like a bad idea for a doubles partner. Blaise had been more promising, but he refused to practise with anyone and probably wouldn't even try out for the doubles.
As Harry had expected Daphne – along with a load of others, in fairness – had given up on the duelling just after the sessions started to get more difficult, so he couldn't ask her. Millicent had lasted a bit longer, but she too had quit. That left Tracey, who had been surprisingly good in Harry's view, but who was – like Blaise – very secretive about her practises and whom Harry had barely seen over the past week outside of lessons.
So all of that led to Harry practising his duelling alone in the dungeons after lessons, whenever he wasn't at a flying session, at least. He'd chosen a disused dungeon room that had a couple of chairs and some desks in but was otherwise empty.
Harry got up from his chair – an old, scruffy thing that looked and felt like it had been stashed away for a least a century – to go over the spell sequence a few more times before dinner.
The trickiest part for Harry was the Mirror Charm, a neat little spell Flitwick said could be used to reflect some of the minor jinxes used in Novice duels. The lack of a partner was only a small inconvenience to practising that particular charm, fortunately, as although it could reflect spells, Harry could tell whether he'd got it right because the wand gave off a bright little sparkle after the spell was correctly cast.
The trouble was, Harry couldn't quite manage it correctly. He'd excelled with the Stinging Jinx, the Knockback Hex, and even the Tap-Dancing Jinx during sessions, but found the less offensive spells much more difficult.
Harry moved through the spell sequence again, miming each of the spells as there wasn't any point using them against nothing, and when it came time to slip in the Mirror Charm he cast it – badly. Harry's wand gave out a sad little fizzle of magical energy and he knew he'd failed to cast the charm properly. Cast like that in a duel, at best it would fail to reflect the incoming jinx, and at worst it would do something utterly bizarre.
'Remember Wizard Baruffio', thought Harry, as Flitwick always said. But even that didn't help him cast the spell properly.
Harry groaned in frustration.
"I know I've got the incantation right," he complained to himself, "so why won't it just… Argh! This is bollocks!"
Harry knew he had the timing, the words, and even the movements perfectly correct. Flitwick had assured him of it during their last session. He even knew how to manoeuvre his wand just so to get it into the right place for a reflection. He'd practised over and over again until it was practically automatic. The issue seemed to be with Harry's frame of mind since the spell had a mental component.
According to Flitwick, the spell needed a clear mind, and evidently, Harry's mind was not clear.
"I will get it right," Harry muttered.
"Need to eat…" Harry heard that other student, somewhere in the dungeons near to him, complain. Well, that was something Harry could relate to, as dinner was right around the corner and moving through all the spell sequences quickly and repeatedly was hungry work.
"I do wish he'd just shut up, though," said Harry. He'd thought about going to have a look for whoever else was in the dungeons – maybe Blaise, although it didn't sound like him – and giving them a talking to about how loud they were being. What was the point of coming all the way down into the bowels of the castle to practise in secret if they were just going to telegraph their location by shouting all the bloody time? He hadn't, of course, since it might very well be an upper year, some of whom were known to use quite nasty spells on lower years who got in their way and Harry didn't much fancy a trip to the Hospital Wing late on a school night.
Instead, Harry gathered up his things and made his way back up through the dungeons to the Common Room to get ready for dinner.
As October dawned Harry found himself very busy indeed. Homework was completed in group study sessions during their free periods. That had been the easiest, most pain-free, way of getting all the necessary work done, and it was one endorsed by the teachers, even. That left his evenings and weekends free. Not for recreation, but for gruelling sessions of flying and duelling practise.
Tuesdays and Fridays were reserved, as they had been for a few weeks already, for the Duelling Club and its preparations for the Pariturium. On the first Tuesday in October Harry, along with those of his friends still committed to participation in the duelling competition, made their way to the Great Hall for that evening's practise dressed in their sport robes, wands at the ready.
"We'll be starting to really duel soon," said Tracey as the four of them walked towards the Hall from the dungeons. "It's so exciting! I can't wait."
"We've already started duelling," said Theodore.
"No, I mean really duelling," said Tracey. "We've just been doing, you know, choreographed and guided stuff so far. 'Do this', then 'do that'. I heard one of the Juniors saying that Flitwick wants to see how we've learned so far, so he can choose our team for the competition, so I'm sure he'll have us doing proper duels next."
Blaise nodded along with Tracey.
"I'll bet he wants to know who's going through, just so he can start training us properly," Blaise said. "The Tournament starts on Hallowe'en, doesn't it? So we've not got very long now."
Theodore considered it.
"Well, that does make sense… I hope there's still enough time to practise, though. I'm not convinced I'll get through at this rate…" he said.
"Well, you did drop your wand in that last demonstration against that Bell girl," said Blaise, "so you do need to get better sharpish."
Privately, Harry agreed with that assessment. If Theodore wanted to get through, he'd need to work on… well, quite a lot of things. It didn't seem especially likely at his current rate of progress.
"She hit my hand with the Stinging Jinx," muttered Theodore.
Blaise shrugged.
"That's what the Mirror Charm is for."
"I know what it's for," snapped Theodore in a rare display of annoyance. "But doing it in the duel is harder than it sounds..."
"Yeah, well, don't get shirty with me because you can't figure it out," said Blaise.
By then they'd reached the Great Hall, which cut off the argument before it began. The duelling stage had been placed in the middle of the Hall as usual, although the Hall itself was nowhere near as full as it had been during the start of the sessions. More than half of the people who'd signed up for the Duelling Club initially had quit.
The target dummies that had been a feature of the last few sessions were absent at this week's session, although both Flitwick and Snape were stood on the stage as usual. The much smaller crowd of Club members gathered around the stage in two halves to wait for the beginning of the session.
They didn't have to wait long.
"Now, then," said Flitwick once the doors to the Hall had closed themselves after all the attendees had arrived. "We have eight more Club sessions until the Tournament begins—including this session, of course!—and so we must begin to move very quickly if we are to present any sort of decent competition for our foreign colleagues. We must start duelling in earnest if we are to be ready by Hallowe'en!" Flitwick rubbed his hands together. "To that end the next few sessions shall consist not of preparation and training, as they have previously, but of actual duelling in accordance with Circuit rules."
At that announcement an enthusiastic murmur ran out through the assembled students as they realised the very thing they'd been waiting for since the start of term had arrived – real duels. Well, duels according to the Circuit's rules and regulations for Juniors and Novices, which was close enough for Harry.
"Naturally, Professor Snape and I will be watching all of the duels keenly as we try to put together a good roster for the duelling competition—and I should say that our choices must be finalised prior to the arrival of the delegations from Beauxbatons and Durmstrang, so the very last Friday session at the absolute latest is when we shall make our decisions. We shall have a selection of duels today and on Friday from volunteers in both categories, but after this week's sessions we shall be holding a little internal tournament—two for each of the groups, in fact—which shall help us both to understand the capabilities of all you hopefuls. The first of our tournaments will be singles, but now would be a good time to consider your partners for the paired competition—if you wish to participate, of course. But for now, I shall be taking volunteers from the Novices to duel today, and Professor Snape shall take volunteers from the Juniors. Let us begin!"
Flitwick moved to the edge of the stage to take volunteers. Not very many put themselves forwards at first, so Harry elbowed his way through the people in his way and put his name down for the duels that day. Unsurprisingly, Blaise followed him, and so did Tracey. After that Flitwick was swarmed with Novices wanting to duel, and Harry wondered if he would even get the opportunity to duel that evening.
Unfortunately, Snape called up Cedric Diggory and a fifth year Gryffindor girl named Oleander Thompson to do the first of the duels. Harry put his disappointment to the back of mind to watch the Juniors in their duel.
Snape counted the Juniors in and after perfunctory bows, the duel was on.
Diggory started the duel off strong. He lunged forward and moved his wand through one of the tricky sequences the Juniors had been learning – a set of spells Harry hadn't yet and wouldn't encounter for a while in his own studies – but each of them faded away to nothing as they crashed into Thompson's Shield Charm.
She hadn't even had to move to block Diggory's spells. It was a pity the Shield Charm was banned for the Novices.
Thomspon didn't wait around after that. She shifted her weight from one foot to the other and then responded with a flurry of spells of her own, including one which made Diggory jump out of the way. Harry made a note to go over the list of spells Flitwick had given the Juniors at some point, since even though he couldn't use most of them in his own duels, they seemed like good things to know about. The Shield Charm seemed like a powerful spell, an excellent all-rounder useful outside of sport duelling – but most of the others Harry didn't recognise at all.
As Diggory struggled to retain his balance Thompson started with another sequence, but Diggory righted himself before she got going with it.
Diggory conjured a small flock of swarming birds next and sent them right at Thompson. The squawking, squalling birds swarmed around Thompson, pecking and flapping.
Harry watched Thompson struggle to vanish the conjured birds and saw merit in the technique. It allowed Diggory to drop into a quick, smooth spell sequence that meant Thompson had to decide between vanishing birds and defending herself from the barrage of spells sent by Diggory.
We do start basic conjuration this year, Harry thought as he watched. Perhaps he could manage something similar...
But the birds, along with Diggory's spells, bounced off Thompson's Shield Charm. With an irritated flick of her wand, Thompson vanished the birds, then hit back at Diggory with a flurry of hexes.
Immediately Diggory conjured a solid barrier which shattered under the impact of Thompson's spells. Harry wondered why he hadn't used a Shield Charm, opting instead for a much more complex solution, but before he could spend any time to identify Thompson's hexes, Diggory moved again.
Diggory cast several spells in quick succession, moving from each spell to the next with smooth, fluid movements. Harry could only recognise a couple of them – the Stickfast Hex and a stunner – as Diggory had moved to silent casting.
Thompson threw up a quick Shield Charm which absorbed the hit of the stunner but broke after the last of Diggory's spells hit it. With Thompson momentarily staggered by Diggory's onslaught, Diggory took the chance to disarm the fifth year Gryffindor girl, and her wand dropped to the duelling stage floor.
"Oho! Excellent, excellent," said Flitwick. "This bout goes to Diggory. Take ten points for Hufflepuff—and Gryffindor—for that wonderful display of duelling prowess," he said as he clapped. "Don't you agree, Professor Snape? A round of applause, please!"
"An adequate display," said Snape. "Although perhaps not quite as ambitious as would be necessary in the Pariturium."
The other students in the Hall clapped for Diggory and Thompson as the pair descended from the duelling stage. The duel had been good, at least in Harry's opinion. Not especially long, no, and maybe not as ambitious as Snape would have liked, but Harry felt like it was a decent example of the kind of things the Juniors were up to. It did also give him a few ideas for the Novice level duels, if he could pull off any of them, at least.
"Some of you might have noticed Miss Thompson's use of the Nudging Charm," continued Flitwick. "The Nudging Charm can bypass the Shield Charm because it is not technically a jinx—it is so inoffensive that the Shield Charm does not cover it! It has almost no use outside of formal Circuit duelling, but within that context it is a marvellous little spell because it forces your opponent to make a choice: get hit by the Nudging Charm, and award your opponent points, or move out of the way and interrupt your flow. Now of course, there are much nastier spells that the ordinary Shield Charm cannot protect from, but those have no place within any reputable duelling Circuit and so we shall not discuss them here. I am told that Professor Moody will be discussing them with you this year, in any case, so you shall not want for an opportunity to learn. Mr Diggory showed us a nice example of how transfiguration may be used during a duel—I would ask you all to think more on this, and other more unorthodox methods, as we move on. Of course keeping in mind the rules and regulations of the Circuit!" Flitwick paused. "Next, a duel from the Novices, I should think. We shall have Mr Potter against Miss Bones."
That announcement gave Harry reason to pause.
He had a vague idea of what he would do during the duel: try to use the spell sequences he'd drilled endlessly and try to avoid having to use the Mirror Charm. Of course, some old duellist had said, according to Flitwick, that any plan which survived the start of a duel was a bad plan, so Harry knew he ought to be a bit more flexible.
And it's only the first go at it.
Harry walked up the steps to the duelling stage with Susan and then stood a few paces away from her.
"Always remember to bow!" directed Flitwick. "After the count of one..."
Harry got into place with his wand in hand, then waited for the duel to begin. He dropped into an awkward bow to Susan and then waited for Flitwick to count down to the start of the duel.
As soon as Flitwick finished the count Harry made his move. He fired off a Stinging Jinx, Knockback Hex, and a Tap-Dancing Jinx in quick succession, fast enough that Susan hadn't begun to cast yet. Almost as if it was no effort at all, Susan deflected his jinxes with two well-placed Mirror Charms, although she did have to sidestep his Knockback Hex.
Susan responded immediately. She dropped into an offensive stance and jabbed her wand into a Pimple Jinx which she blended smoothly into a Full-Body Bind. Harry lowered his wand and jumped out of the way of Susan's spells, keenly aware of his difficulties with the Mirror Charm. Harry briefly considered a bit of conjuration, but the only thing he could manage was a bit of water, and that not especially well. Instead, Harry used a variation on the wand-lighting charm paired with a nifty little sonic boom he'd found at the back of an old charms book to create an ersatz flashbang grenade.
The end of Harry's wand flashed with a great white light that lit up the Great Hall, followed by the whoosh of a sonic boom.
Harry's trick worked, and Susan staggered backwards shielding her eyes with her forearm. Harry pressed his advantage with a minor variation of his most practised spell sequence – Pimple Jinx into Stinging Jinx into Knockback Hex – but after being struck by the Pimple Jinx, Susan artfully shot his own Stinging Jinx back at him with a Mirror Charm. While Harry dodged his own spell, Susan pirouetted away from his Knockback Hex.
Harry grimaced. Susan was simply too good with the Mirror Charm for him to win any points with spells – and Harry too bad with it to keep up a war of attrition. Harry knew a couple of hexes that were both on the approved list of spells for Novice duellists and which would get around the Mirror Charm, but he didn't quite know whether he could pull them off, especially not now that he'd seen Susan's agility in action.
Harry jumped to avoid Susan's next barrage of spells – a spell sequence including one of the hexes Harry had been planning to use himself – and then returned several of his own. He saved a Twitchy-Ears Hex for last, swishing his wand just so at the end. Predictably, Susan managed to reflect most of his spells, but didn't manage to dodge the Twitchy-Ears Hex in time.
Harry grinned widely as Susan's ears started to twitch. As well as that her cheeks turned bright red, and knowing Susan as he did, Harry could see the pretty Hufflepuff was getting angry.
"Impedimenta!" he said, taking quick advantage of Susan's moment of anger. Almost as soon as the spell left his wand Harry followed it up with a Confusion Hex that Susan couldn't reflect. She had to move to avoid each of them, and while she was more concerned with those, Harry cast the Disarming Charm with as much force as he could muster.
Fortunately, his gambit worked, and Susan dropped her wand.
Harry felt a rush of exhilaration that he'd only ever felt before while flying and realised that he liked duelling. It was a little bit awkward to have beaten his friend, but they'd both known what they'd signed up for, and Susan had put up a brilliant fight. If his Disarming Charm hadn't worked, Harry knew Susan would have eventually won – she could afford to drag out the duel due to her strong footwork and command of the Mirror Charm and no doubt would have won on points.
"Ah, bravo!" said Flitwick. "Take ten points each to Hufflepuff and Slytherin for that wonderful duel! There were some excellent techniques on display for that duel—Miss Bones clearly has a marvellous grasp on the Mirror Charm, and Mr Potter should be commended for his use of sonic booms paired with a modified lighting charm to bedazzle his opponent. Indeed, that performance from each of our duellists today would have been rewarded by a nice amount of points in a formal Circuit duel. I should say however that Mr Potter would have lost points for excessive movement in situations where a Mirror Charm would be more appropriate, so despite the duel being decided in his favour, it was a very sloppy win. Professor Snape, any thoughts?"
Harry nodded along at the explanation. It was more-or-less as he'd thought, although it was never nice being referred to as 'sloppy'.
"'Sloppy' is an understatement," said Snape. "If I were to judge Mr Potter's performance today according to Circuit rules I would score him a zero for style. Miss Bones, however, performed satisfactorily."
Harry bit back a retort about Snape's own sense of style, since it was rude and wouldn't get him anywhere, and tried instead to take in the message behind the dour man's words. Snape wasn't wrong – Harry had been moving all over the place to avoid spells that could be simply and easily deflected with a Mirror Charm – but the words still stung.
It was never nice to be reminded of a deficiency, especially not in public.
"Yes, well… I wouldn't go quite that far, perhaps…" said Flitwick. "Well, the both of you should be proud of your performance this evening—for a first duel, it was more than acceptable! Miss Bones you are to be commended for your footwork! Mr Potter, while you are very clearly comfortable with jinxes and hexes, perhaps a little more work on defence is necessary before our next session. We have enough time for another duel between the Juniors, next, so if you would both clear the stage…"
Harry got off the stage and returned to his friends.
"Ah, Miss Bones—come here so I may remove Mr Potter's Twitchy-Ears Hex," said Flitwick before Susan left. "We can't have you going to dinner like that after all!"
"That was brilliant!" said Tracey once Harry had re-joined the group. "Well done!"
"You do need to work on your Mirror Charms, though," said Blaise. "But otherwise… yeah, you were good. I'd have struggled against you, I think."
"God, it feels like all I'm doing is working on bloody Mirror Charms," said Harry. "But thanks for, well, you know. It's good to win."
"'It's good to win,' he says," said Blaise. "No shit."
"We should be quiet," said Theodore. "The next duel is starting, look."
True enough, the next duel was about to start, and since he'd learned so much from watching Diggory and Thompson, Harry immediately turned back to the stage to watch. The pair of duellists – a Ravenclaw fourth year girl and a Gryffindor fifth year boy – put up a good fight but, in Harry's opinion at least, the duel between Diggory and Thompson had been better.
Neither of the two duellists currently on the stage attempted to use more unorthodox strategies or techniques, sticking instead with a series of admittedly well-executed spell sequences. It was duelling by numbers rather than anything innovative, Harry thought, but was still more interesting than anything the Novices could put out just by virtue of the expanded spell set. The Ravenclaw girl won the duel in the end after shattering the Gryffindor's Shield Charm with a stunner.
After the duel Flitwick went over what they'd done well and where they could have improved, then sent the Duelling Club away to get ready for dinner. Despite the relatively lacklustre finishing duel, Harry was in a very good mood as he and his friends made their way back to the dungeons to prepare for dinner.
"That was pretty good! I can't wait for the tournaments next week!" said Harry.
"It'll be good to really test ourselves against each other," agreed Blaise. "See where we stand. After all, there are only ten places… We can't all be getting one."
"Well, there are twenty for the paired duelling," said Tracey, "but there are still more than twenty hopefuls… I wonder if we'll get to choose our own partners, or if Flitwick and Snape will do it."
Harry hadn't thought about that – he'd assumed they'd be able to choose, and had thought about asking Tracey. But if Flitwick and Snape were to be in charge, he could be placed with anyone.
"Hopefully we can choose," Harry said. "Or at least if we get through, Flitwick and Snape choose someone nice."
Blaise shrugged.
"I'm not trying out for the paired competition," he said, "so it doesn't matter for me."
"At this rate I'll just be happy to get a place," said Theodore. "In whichever bit they'll have me!"
They went their separate ways once they reached the Common Room, as they each had different things they wanted to do before dinner. Harry took the chance to jump in the shower quickly, since the duel had been stressful and he felt sweaty. By the time he finished, it was time for dinner.
As much as Harry wanted to spend his entire weekend working on his duelling he couldn't, because he had to attend to his flying. Just like with the duelling, Hooch wanted, and needed, to finalise her selections for the upcoming competition prior to the arrival of the delegations from the other schools. That was all well and good, but it did mean that Harry had a weekend crammed full of flying and not much else. Not that that was a problem for him, exactly, but it was quite a lot of flying to get through in a short amount of time. Harry had already qualified for a spot in the speed racing the previous week, which had sent him into the next round of qualifiers with a nice amount of confidence for what was about to come.
That weekend, however, Hooch had scheduled the first set of hazard flying qualifiers, and that was a different kind of flying altogether. Something almost completely unlike any flying Harry had ever done before.
Mercifully she'd allowed all the hopefuls to practise a modified version of what was ahead using bludgers, but everyone thought the actual qualifiers would have something much nastier to contend with despite Hooch's assertions that bludgers were more than suitable for preparation.
The actual group attempting to grab a place in the hazard flying was the smallest of all the groups – probably because most people were too afraid of the idea of being hit by bludgers or God only knew what as they attempted to navigate their way to the finish line. Even so, there were thirty flyers in each of the categories who'd made it through Hooch's preliminary screening, and some of them Harry rated quite highly as competition.
"I'll be glad when this is all over with and we can get on with the real flying," complained Draco to Harry as they all waited for Hooch to start the day off. "We all know most of these idiots won't get through, so why we have to go through the whole palaver is beyond me."
"It does have to be fair," said Harry.
"I'm not saying otherwise," said Draco, "but you can't deny that Hooch probably already knows who she wants going through, and it's definitely not McClaggen."
Well, Harry couldn't exactly disagree with that. He glanced over at the boorish Gryffindor and nodded to himself.
"Alright, yeah, I see what you mean," said Harry. "But it's good to practise with everyone though, isn't it?"
"A bloody centaur would be better than McClaggen!" declared Draco. "His situational awareness is shit."
Harry shrugged.
"He's not who we're up against, remember. Not really," said Harry, although it was only partially true – nobody wanted the other schools to win, but most of the flying events weren't team events, and students from Hogwarts would be in competition with each other as well as the other schools. So Harry had as much to worry about from Draco as he did from whoever the other schools had chosen to represent them, now and later on.
Hooch arrived carrying her broom and with two boxes of bludgers following behind her and all the Nimbuses behind them, escorted by Miss Evergloam and Miss Gamp, each with brooms of their own.
"Good, you're all here," said Hooch when she came to a stop. "Today you'll be facing bludgers and an array of spells provided and monitored by Miss Gamp and Miss Evergloam, all while flying through a predefined course. This will be the toughest of the flying events you've faced yet, and I should caution you that it will be much harder in the actual competition. Now, I'm sure all of you are perfectly capable of getting through this course, but if you'd like to forego it, you should leave now. Once you're up in the air, that's it, you finish or you fall. There's no turning back, as you'll see once we get started."
That announcement caused a little bit of consternation from the assembled group, but Harry wasn't overly worried. Hooch was decent enough at basic medical spells that a fall would be manageable, and with Miss Evergloam and Miss Gamp there, the odds were good that it'd be a swift trip to the Hospital Wing. He was honestly more worried about the spells the two apprentices would be using to hinder the flyers, since it was something they hadn't covered in practises.
But Harry hadn't turned up completely unaware – he'd scoured the library for all content relating to hazard flying, from newspapers to journal articles and everything else – so he did have a basic plan of action. Unlike the other flying events, use of a wand was allowed to deal with some of the hazards. Harry hadn't expected to have to use it that morning, but given the two apprentices' appearance at the course, he let go of that idea.
They wouldn't have turned up if they'd had nothing to do, after all.
Nobody left after Hooch's announcement although Harry hadn't thought anyone would. Everyone still interested in the hazard flying after the practises with the bludgers over the past month had been battered enough already that a little more wouldn't do any lasting harm.
"Alright. Let's be getting on with it, then," said Hooch. She sorted the waiting students into three groups of ten, then handed out brooms to the first group. Harry's group was to be first in the air.
"Righto," said Hooch. "What we'll do now is fly up to the start point so you can get a good view of what we're about to do, and then you'll fly through the course. You should know already what the rules are but some of them bear repeating—you lose a point every time you get hit by, or hit, a hazard. You can gain a point for skilful evasion. Most points at the end wins the race. We'll take ten through today and cut that down to five tomorrow. Now let's get on with it!"
Hooch released the bludgers and then kicked off and sped away, leaving the students and her two assistants scrambling to catch up. Harry joined her up in the air, up near the far side of the Quidditch Pitch.
Hooch flew in a lazy figure of eight in front of a large, shimmering curtain of light. Harry had no idea what it was, but it certainly felt and looked magical, and it undulated according to some unknown and unseen force. The bludgers shot through it one by one, following whatever commands Hooch had given them.
"This is Karamazov's Tunnel," shouted Hooch once all ten of the flyers had reached her and the strange magical curtain. "You cannot see its edges, but it forms a tunnel between this end of the hazard course and the exit, and once you pass through, you can only come out at the other end. You will not be able to land, although if you fall it won't catch you. After the count of one you will all pass through the Tunnel aperture and the hazard course will begin!"
Harry regarded the Tunnel entrance dubiously. He had heard of it before but hadn't expected to see one during the competition – or even at all, as it was usually only used at the really high-end of elite hazard flying. Nonetheless, he was sat in front of one on a borrowed broom about to start a professional-tier hazard course.
While Hooch had been talking, Miss Evergloam and Miss Gamp had both joined everyone else up in the air and had taken up positions halfway along the route. Marker rings like in the speed racing had been placed throughout the course, and Harry saw the bludgers whizzing around chaotically. The two apprentices immediately started to cast spells, placing little whirlwinds and all sorts of other odd spells around the course – in addition to those that were already there.
Harry glanced around at the others in his group. He'd been placed with one of the Weasley twins – although he couldn't tell which – along with Chang, the Ravenclaw Seeker, both of whom he rated as his main competition within the group. Thankfully Draco had been picked for another group and was still on the ground waiting, so he didn't have to worry about that. Still, Chang and Weasley and several of the others were much more experienced flyers than Harry, having spent a few years flying in all kinds of weather already. Even McClaggen had more experience on a broom, although perhaps not as much talent.
"After the count of one!" said Hooch. She waited a few moments for her words to sink in and then started her countdown. "Three, two, one!"
Despite his misgivings, Harry shot off through the Tunnel aperture without a thought for the others in his group. Once through, he was shocked to find that it was dark inside the Tunnel! He had just enough light to see after his eyes adjusted to the dim, but only just. Still, he couldn't waste time worrying about that, as there were bludgers and whatever else whizzing about.
Harry located the first of the marker rings and sped off for it, aware that some of his fellow competitors had already got off to a good start. He spotted a small figure who he thought was Chang just ahead of him and coaxed his broom forward so he wouldn't be left behind.
The bludgers were Harry's main problem – getting hit meant losing points – but were still only just ahead of his competition in Harry's ranking of priorities. Not being able to see properly made looking out for bludgers harder but they did make a characteristic noise as they whizzed through the air. He dipped the end of his broom to avoid an encroaching Bludger, before passing through the first marker. Immediately on the other side Harry swerved to miss some sort of spell – he didn't recognise it at all, so it could have done anything, and it gave him goosebumps as he passed it.
Harry sailed past Chang, who'd gotten stuck in a whirlwind, tossed around in its enchanted vortex. He gave that a wide berth.
A Bludger smacked into Harry's back with a loud crack, and he nearly fell off his broom. After a course adjustment, Harry righted himself and looked about. Weasley zipped past him, a thick Beater's bat in his hand, and then knocked another Bludger back.
Harry jerked his broom upwards to avoid the second Bludger.
"That fucker!" Harry swore. Weasley must have conjured himself a Beater's bat to use in the competition, which wasn't actually against the rules although it was a tricky little move. The bastard played as Beater usually and would be able to make excellent use of the Bat. Another thing Harry would have to avoid. He briefly thought about doing the same thing himself but decided against it. He didn't have the experience with a bat to pull it off and would lose far too much time and concentration trying it with his lacklustre skill in conjuring.
Chang zoomed right past Harry, evidently freed from the magical whirlwind. Harry grunted and followed her.
Harry dodged another couple of bludgers as he navigated the dim hazard course in search of the next marker. He found it placed just behind a semi-opaque, almost filmy, sheet of light, at the front of an enclosed narrow tunnel. Harry hovered just in front of it hesitantly. He grabbed his wand and cast a General Counterspell at the marker opening, but nothing happened.
"Bugger," said Harry. If he knew what spell had been used, perhaps he could have negated it with a more specific countercharm, but that seemed to be a solution for another day. Instead, Harry moved through the sheet.
Immediately Harry's centre shifted. The entire world shifted, at least as far as Harry could tell, vertically. Harry moved through the tunnel slowly in anticipation of some nasty obstacle, but he didn't find any. Slightly buoyed, he eased the broom out of the other end of the tunnel and then felt sick as the world spun right around again.
Harry struggled to right his broom after a shift in his perception yet again, and then heard the tell-tale buzzing of a Bludger as it whooshed past him, just narrowly avoiding his head after a lucky last-minute swerve. Harry pushed forward, mindful that the others might catch up to him. He already had Weasley and Chang ahead of him and didn't want to allow anyone else to gain any ground.
It was difficult to see where he was in relation to anything, since the Tunnel blocked his view of the outside and the inside was about as bright as the dungeons with the lamps off, but between the next set of markers Harry could just about make out the next obstacle. A gauntlet of scythes swung back and forth in between the next two markers. Chang slipped through like a bullet, just narrowly missing the very last scythe. Harry heard McClaggen swear as he went through the tunnel just behind, only to get whacked by a Bludger.
Harry slowed his broom to almost a stop to get a good view of the pattern and cadence to the scythes' movement. Although he trusted the skills of Madam Pomfrey to put him back together, Harry thought it still preferable to just not get cut up in the first place. He waited a few moments until he thought he'd got it, then coaxed his broom through the swinging scythes.
He couldn't move at a constant speed since each of the pairs of scythes had their own rhythm. Harry instead had to vary his speed after passing through each pair. He moved forward in jerky, stopping motions, paying attention to the cadence of the scythes. He made it out the other end unscathed, then shot off towards the next marker.
Harry saw Weasley make a wide, arching turn back in search of a Bludger to whack at his competition, then made a tricky series of turns to get out of the way once the ginger Beater had found it. The Bludger hit McClaggen instead as he emerged – unharmed, which Harry thought was a miracle – from the scythes.
Harry overtook Chang then came to an abrupt stop in front of a gigantic – relatively speaking – whirling maelstrom of wind and magic. Weasley had ploughed ahead but had become caught in the maelstrom – the other boy was being whipped around like a paper bag in the wind as he struggled to stay on his broom.
Harry flew in wide circled around the edge of the maelstrom in an attempt to find a way around. In the end, he concluded there wasn't any. The maelstrom spanned the height and width of the Tunnel, with no way to slip around, under, or over it. If Harry had the skill and the knowledge to remove the spell, perhaps that would have been an answer, but that seemed far above Harry's level of learning. It looked like Harry would have to just fly right through it, although he didn't fancy his chances, not with how Weasley still struggled to get free.
"Hang on," muttered Harry. He watched for the direction of the wind and saw that it was all moving in one direction. True, large bursts threw off the pattern every so often, but Harry saw the pattern nonetheless.
It seemed as if Chang had the same idea, as she shot her broom through at a diagonal, following the path of the wind. It worked, too, as she suffered much less resistance than Weasley. Harry followed her, confident now that he could get through without much fuss.
He felt less confidence once he entered the swirling mass of magical wind. Despite moving with it, his broom didn't quite go where he wanted it. The broom's nose jerked from side to side in the wind as Harry wrestled with the wind. Harry tried to angle himself so that he came shooting out the opposite side of the maelstrom, but instead, he slowly climbed it. He was in good company, as the same thing had happened to Chang, and although Weasley had caught on to the right technique, he still wasn't out of it either.
Harry heard a positive in the form of McClaggen shouting obscenities as he got tossed about in the wind, and although it didn't really help Harry, it did make him feel better.
Harry angled his broom downwards as he got swept around the maelstrom once more. Going along with the flow was the right way to get around the obstacle, but evidently not the way to get out of it. Harry thought that if he kept with it until just before the far side of the maelstrom relative to where he'd come in, a sharp turn would let him escape.
He hoped so, at the very least. Harry waited until he got swept around again, then jerked his broom sharply. He got shot out of the maelstrom and went careening off into the distance until he regained control of his broom. Just as he righted himself, a bludger smacked into his hand with a sickening crack.
He swore, then chanced a look at his hand. Harry grimaced when he saw his fingers pointing various directions, then tried to move it. He winced as pain coursed through it, then decided it was probably broken.
Harry didn't know any healing spells since they had yet to cover them in Charms – not even quick and dirty emergency variants – so he grit his teeth and forced his hand closed around the broom handle. He could get it fixed later, and there were still bludgers roaming about to look out for, so he couldn't worry about it too long.
Harry located the new few markers, and passed through them quickly, mindful that he'd painstakingly won a little lead for himself after the maelstrom. He nipped through a series of tricky little whirlwinds, then dove to avoid yet another bludger.
Just up ahead Harry saw what he thought was the exit to Karamazov's Tunnel. The way ahead looked clear enough, although Harry didn't totally trust his eyes given the gloom and the things he'd just passed through. He didn't doubt that Hooch had dreamed up something nasty for the finish line.
Harry held his wand in one hand and kept his other hand – painfully – wrapped around the broom handle as he moved forwards. He thought he could sense a crackle in the air, the tell-tale feel of magic lurking just that little bit away.
Harry cast the General Counterspell at the wide space ahead of him and then frowned when it appeared to do nothing. He could still feel that subtle crackle of whatever spell was in his way, but his main tool for battling it had done nothing. Harry knew that curse breakers had a whole set of diagnostic spells they used to figure out what sorts of unknown spells were in front of them, but Harry didn't know any.
In the end, Harry decided that the only thing he could do was fly straight through the magical field and hope for the best. He kept hold of his wand just in case and guided his broom towards the Tunnel exit. Immediately after breaching the bounds of the strange spell his mind exploded with a vast array of new and unusual sights and sounds.
Harry felt like a blade of grass, far below on the Forest floor; then like a leaf blowing in the wind; and then as a tree, strong and tall and enduring for centuries. He couldn't tell whether he was even still on his broom, let alone whether he was still flying through the magical field. Instead, all he could think about – the only thing that mattered – were his roots in the soft, damp soil, or the delicious earth in his mouth as he ate his way through the dirt – or the crunch of the leaves as he chewed his way through them leaf by leaf, or the feel of his dozens of feet move in sequence—
With great difficulty Harry attempted to wrangle his dispersed sense of awareness back into his own head. He tried to forget the feel of the earth against his roots, or the swaying of his leaves in the breeze, and focus on what was really important – the boy sat on a broom, drifting aimlessly in a Karamazov's Tunnel, tantalisingly close to the exit.
Harry tore himself away from the soft, comforting earth and focused himself on the feel of flying. He felt the wind across his face as he soared above the Forest trees, his wings outstretched as he made his way back to his nest.
That was wrong, again. He blocked out the feel of his wings as he soared, and instead focused on the buzzing sound he always heard when he flew – and then realised that he was wrong, again. He was a bee, zipping from flower to flower in search of sweet nectar, when what he wanted to be was a boy, sat on a broom, about to win a hazard race.
Dimly, at the back of his much expanded mind, Harry's broken hand throbbed as it clung to the end of the broom handle. Harry tried to remember the pain as the bludger smashed the bones in his hand, and pushed out all the other thoughts, feelings, and sensations from his mind.
And then he was a boy, in pain, on a broom in a magically-enclosed tunnel once more.
Harry glanced around the see whether anyone had caught up to him and saw both Chang and Weasley drifting through the air without any sense of direction or purpose. He grinned widely. McClaggen was unlikely to have beaten Chang or Weasley to the weird spell they were trapped in, so Harry knew he had a clear shot to be first out of the Tunnel.
He zipped through the exit marker and re-emerged into the bright, wide open, world at the end of the Tunnel. The first thing he heard and saw as his eyes adjusted to the sunlight was Hooch sat on her broom, clapping.
"Oh, bravo, Potter! Excellent flying. Land at the far side of the Pitch and wait for us to finish up, there's a good lad! We can debrief afterwards!" said Hooch. She pointed to where she meant and then returned her gaze to a little object that looked like a hand-mirror.
Harry flew off to where Hooch had indicated and waited for everyone else to finish up. His hand throbbed, and he knew the bones were broken, but he could wait a while longer to get it fixed, he supposed. The others in his cohort joined him in dribs and drabs. First Chang, and then Weasley, and eventually a rather bedraggled McClaggen. They had to wait about an hour for all the other groups to finish, but eventually everyone – minus a few who had fallen or been too badly injured in their attempt to finish the course – waited for Hooch to announce who'd made it through to the next round. Fortunately, she did give everyone a once-over with basic healing spells, which sorted Harry's hand right out.
"That was some good flying from all of you," said Hooch at the end of the day's hazard racing. "Some of you were a little too frightened of blade challenge, and we'll have to work on that. It's perfectly safe—they were all charmed not to cut through bone! All in all, though, I must say I was very pleased. A little bit tricky at the end with the Extrasensory Field, but most of you managed it well enough. Now, for what you've all been waiting to hear—the ten I'll be taking through to the next round."
Harry listened eagerly to the list of students who'd made it through. Hooch listed the students off, nodding whenever she came to a name he'd thought would make it through. In the end she reeled off a list of students including Harry, Draco, Chang, Weasley, and Montague – even McClaggen had managed to sneak through.
"For a more complete breakdown of your scores you can come see me in my office," said Hooch. "Those of you who passed through—congratulations, and I'll be seeing you tomorrow for the final qualification race."
Hooch dismissed the students, and Harry walked back to the Slytherin Common Room along with Draco, Montague, and several others.
"That wasn't so bad," said Harry. "The worst bit was that massive whirlwind in the middle, I thought."
"Nah, the Extrasensory Field nearly did me in," said Montague. "I can cope with a bit of wind, but…" He trailed off, and gazed into the distance, then shuddered. "There's got to be a spell to deal with that, because I sure as shit ain't going through it again."
"I was worried for my broom going through the blades," said Draco. "I thought they probably wouldn't use something that would kill us, but brooms are only brooms and the Ministry can just buy new ones…"
"It's only going to get harder form here, I reckon," said Harry. "It's a bit exciting, though, isn't it? I wonder what else they'll throw at us."
Montague grimaced.
"Speak for yourself, Potter. Hazard racing is bloody dangerous and I'm only in it in case I don't qualify for the relays or the speed racing."
Harry shrugged. He found all the flying events fun, even the dangerous hazard course they'd just completed. It would get worse, but that was the point.
When they got back to the Common Room Harry headed straight for the showers, and then spent the rest of his day in the library looking up examples of hazard courses across the world, until he got shooed away by Madam Pince when it closed.
The extra reading helped him through Hooch's final round of qualifiers for the hazard flying the very next day, and Harry went into his next week at school with much more confidence.