Fluer Delacour was a skilled duellist, and she'd clearly been preparing for this. This might have mattered to her more than I'd previously thought. Her spells, her tactics, her power. There was a certain brutality to her movements and strategies that intrigued me.

It was all for naught, though. As skilled as she was, I was just a few notches too skilled for her. Lucius' power being added to my own allowed me to be more wasteful in my use of magic. I could throw out some of the largest transfigurations without breaking a sweat.

I weaved through her barrage of cutting spells and waved my wand to deflect the piercing spells that followed with sharp movements. I tried to return fire with some conjured arrows, but she kept up her barrage.

I slowly moved backwards, around the ring while deflecting every spell that she sent my way. I had to applaud her improvement. Three months ago, and she would have actually won this. The only issue was I was getting better too. I focused my will. Using one of the more esoteric applications of occlumency, I split my focus in two for some parallel processing. The smaller tendril focused on staying ahead of her spells, while the second focused on the fire manipulation that had become second nature to me in the past few weeks. Figuring out fiendfyre seemed to have been the last barrier in my way.

A whip of flames formed in my clenched right hand. I deflected the latest salvo and brought that whip to bear. I could see the fire reflected in those shocked eyes of hers. Unlike what fanon might tell you, part Veela actually had no known wandless fire abilities, which is why I was gobsmacked when my whip bent around her and dispelled itself.

Someone else might have determined that it was a spell of some sort, but my senses were clear on this. That was pure elemental manipulation. If not for branching out my streams of thought, I'd have been too shocked to survive her next onslaught. It came fast and strong. Spells strong enough to rattle my bones as I deflected them, or send goosebumps down my body as I dodged them by a hair. Fuck it. Enough of this. I guess it's time to show off a little.

I thrusted my wand into the ground and turned the entire thing into quicksand. Apart from the small area I stood at of course. The shock on Fleur's face made the minor exhaustion I felt more than worth it. I'd just overcome the natural protections Fluer's magic created around her, and I was well on my way to crashing from magical exhaustion. Definitely not doing this ever again. Not with someone as powerful as Fluer, at least.

She tried her best to take me out while she sunk into the ground, but her efforts proved futile, and the match ended in my favour. I smiled at her mutted curses as I released her from the trap and cleaned her up with a wave of my wand. "Draco Malfoy" She said before enveloping me in a complete hug. I returned it enthusiastically. She'd arrived right on time so there had been no time for us to exchange anything beyond distant pleasantries before the duel began.

"I thought I'd have you this time." She said with a pout and I smiled at the innuendo that came to mind. A smile that died very quickly when I remembered who could have been here with me. Who should have been here with me. Hermione. Her death haunted me in my dreams. All I saw was my failure. My inability to even notice when she fell. All because I was more interested in not putting off the wizarding public. That choice would haunt me forever.

"Splendid. Splendid." Dumbledore said while clapping and approaching us. "A magnificent duel, indeed. Now, there's something I must ask of the two of you"

I turned to the old man in suspicion. "Both Maxime and I agree that just forcing you both to duel twice would not be a fitting end to the saga that this tournament has been. Now, we need your consent to pursue something more interesting for the third task. Something to truly entertain the public and grant you the spectacle you deserve."

I could see Fleur out of the corner of my eyes and I could see she looked almost as suspicious as I was. We'd all consented to two duels because that's what presented the least risk to everyone involved. For Dumbledore to want to change that out of the blue reeked heavily. Especially since there were about a thousand more important things vying for his attention at this point. Hogwarts was still closed, and I'd have assumed that would be his first priority, not making a more interesting tournament.

"And what would this task entail?" Fleur asked and I could barely keep my head from whipping towards her in shock. I hadn't even expected her to be the slightest bit interested in this farce.

"We'll be keeping the details a secret, but rest assured that your safety will be considered in designing every facet of the competition." Out of the corner of my eyes, I could see Fleur contemplating the choice, so I decided to nip the entire thing in its bud.

"No. I agreed to two duels. That's what I'll get" I said as I twirled on my feet and walked away. None of them stopped me so I'd gone a considerable distance when I remembered that the second duel was supposed to be held today. I wasn't going to abide the indignity of walking back there, so I just conjured an armchair in front of the stands and relaxed into it.

From here, I got a good look at the Hogwarts grounds. I'd actually miss this place. It was all so beautiful and idyllic. Hogwarts was truly where everything began for me, and perhaps for dozens of others. It was easy to overlook, with all the things that were clearly wrong with it, but Hogwarts had a lot going for it. The founders had made something amazing. Something that outlived them for centuries, and possibly centuries more. It made me think of my own legacy. I might be young, but what was going to remind people that Draco Malfoy existed after I eventually died? Whether to Voldemort, sickness, or old age. The truth was I'd die eventually. Immortality wasn't even a real option at this point. I was nowhere near smart enough to crack the alchemical discovery of the millennium. I was also nowhere near stupid enough to split my soul on the chance that it wasn't creating Horcruxes that led the charming Tom Riddle to become the psychotic Voldemort.

Those were the only two options I was aware of, and while I'm pretty sure there had to be a few more, I wasn't as sure that they'd actually be useful to me. Either way, I'd live my life like I had a finite number of years left and if I ended up discovering the secrets to immortality then that's just great.

I was brought from my thoughts by the sight of the Veela walking towards me and interrupting my beautiful view of the Hogwarts grounds with an even more beautiful view of her swaying hips.

"Draco Malfoy '' She said with that French accent that did things to me. "Why do you not want more of a spectacle for the final task? You entered to prove yourself, non? How does winning a duel do that?" I turned to look at her and she seemed genuinely interested in getting answers from me. I waved my wand and expanded my armchair into a loveseat that she dropped into before I could even say a word.

"Quite frankly, I'm just tired of all of it. The tournament has gone on for long enough, don't you think?" I asked while turning to look at her and she didn't seem impressed.

"I agreed with Dumbledore and Maxime. Your consent was unnecessary. We'll be having the final task in a month's time, with an audience." After those words, she got off the seat and practically stomped off. What did I do to annoy her?

Since things were practically already settled here, I started making my way back home. I vanished the loveseat and started the trek to the castle gates before I was joined by someone I wasn't expecting.

"Draco. What have you done to yourself?" The old man whispered as he finally got close enough to me.

"I have no idea what you're talking about, Dumbledore" I said and tried to move past him, but he grabbed on to my arm before I could make it very far.

"I sensed something off when you first entered the wards, and then again when you overcame young miss Delacourt's magic. Now that I'm closer to you, I can tell exactly what it is. You've dabbled in very dark magic, Draco, and magic always leaves traces."

"I don't know what you speak of, Headmaster" I stressed the title and pulled my hand out of his grip and continued to walk away.

"Consider this your last warning, Mr. Malfoy. Continue down this path and I'll put you down myself." Even though I wasn't looking at him, the weight of his magic pressing down on me was almost enough to make me piss myself in fear. I just stood there, unable to take a step until he turned his attention from me and began to head back into the castle.

What the actual fuck? That wasn't Dumbledore, what the fuck was going on? I practically ran out of the school and apparated back to the manor. I didn't begin to feel safe again until I felt the wards welcome me as the Lord of the manor.

I took deep breaths to calm my racing heart and tried to think through that threat. What happened to Dumbledore being the beacon of sunshine and forgiveness, and all that crap? There wasn't much sunshine to be seen in threatening my life so brazenly.

I went straight to Armand's new home in the drawing room. "Welcome, my lord. I'm sure you emerged victorious in your duels" The blonde man said as I walked in.

"Not in the mood for your antics today, Armand. I just got threatened."

The atmosphere around the room changed, Armand sat up even straighter than his impossibly perfect posture demanded. "Who would dare?" He asked with fury bruning in his eyes. "Take them. Everything they have and hold dear. Take it all and make it yours. Smite them from the face of the earth. Salt the field with the tears of their women and children…"

"Dumbledore"

"Wait, what?"

"Dumbledore, the headmaster. Greatest wizard since Merlin and all that rot. He seemed to figure out what I'd done to Lucius and threatened me for it." Armand settled in his seat and began stroking his beard. A beard I was sure didn't exist a day ago, but I'd given up on questioning Armand's strangeness. He was something completely different from every portrait I'd previously interacted with.

"Obviously, you can't attack him directly"

"No shit"

…

"I apologise for that. It was crass of me" I said to the man and settled into the chair in the office.

"Perfectly fine, my lord. You have every right to be upset. There are two extremely dangerous men after your head. Have you looked into the auror's program?"

"Madam Bones is still yet to reply to my letter. I'm sure the thing took her by surprise. For now, I'm loathed to go over her head to the minister, but if she continues to dally, then I might have no choice." I said with a sigh.

"Good. Do whatever is necessary to achieve your goals. You need actual fighting experience and while the Auror department might not be the safest way to get it, it's quite a bit more useful than any of the mercenary guilds or even the dueling leagues."

"You know, Armand? Sometimes you frighten me. For someone who lives exclusively in a secluded manor, you're shockingly well informed on the happenings of the wizarding world." This was actually something that had bugged me for a while.

"Bold of you to assume this is the only portrait I have access to" The smug in his voice was apparent to anyone with ears.

"What do you mean?" I asked while slipping my wand into my hand. I trusted Armand, as much as the man annoyed me, but if he'd betrayed that trust, then I'd blow a hole through him regardless of how much I liked the bastard.

"Settle down, Nephew. Let me tell you about the order of the dragon."

XXXXXXXXXXX

I'd wondered how long it would take them to organise the spectacle of a final task that they wanted. The answer to that question came via Owl two weeks after my conversation with Armand. Apparently, I was to prepare myself for the third task in a week.

I had no idea what kind of ideas were going through the heads of the task designers, so I was going to be going into this completely blind. At least for the first task I had the benefit of foreknowledge, and we were told about the second task upfront. Speaking of foreknowledge, at this point I was more than sure that all my knowledge of canon was useless to the nth power. There's no way to know what had changed and what hadn't. I couldn't even be sure that the canon events would have happened without my interference. After all, there wasn't a dueling portion of the triwizard in the canon universe and there's no way my showing up in this universe had caused that, was there?

Either way, my knowledge of the books and movies was useless. Hermione was dead, and Cedric was alive. Snape was missing. Things had gotten out of hand very quickly. It's hard to imagine that four months ago, my greatest worry was being able to dance somewhat competently with the Veela on my hand.

Now, everything had truly become fucked up beyond all reason. Hogwarts was still closed indefinitely, only Merlin knew what happened to the Boy-who-lived in that graveyard, assuming there was still a graveyard this time, and the triwizard had been consigned to a shameful end before the organisers changed their minds. It all smelled of foul play to me.

What would I do to prepare for the task? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. There's nothing I could think of that would be relevant. Sure, I could spend the next week buried in as many tomes on magical creatures as I could find, but something about that just didn't appeal to me. After all, there was magic to be learned. After somewhat mastering fiendfyre, my next goal was taking my manipulation of water to the same level.

Unlike with fire, there wasn't a simple piece of dark magic that learning it practically guaranteed my control over all lesser versions of the element. The aqua eructo charm came close, but it had nowhere near the reputation or difficulty of fiendfyre. Nevertheless, it was still an essential milestone in my journey to complete elemental mastery. I walked out of the castle, having memorised the directions of the spell. I focused my intent on the water and whispered, "aqua eructo" under my breath. Nothing happened. Nothing at all.

That hadn't happened in a while. While I didn't master every spell on the first try, I was usually guaranteed to get some reaction at least. Some effect, no matter how small would have been appreciated. I decided it had to be my wand motions. I practiced the fluid curve a dozen times before I settled into attempting the spell a second time. "Aqua eructo" I said and nothing happened again. Less surprising than the first time, but still astonishing.

Hours later, and the best I got was a light drizzle out of my wand. I could have done better with an aguamenti. Nothing worked. Absolutely nothing. I ended up stomping back to the solar with frustration building around my features.

Armand seemed to tell my mood very quickly and he remained silent as I took a seat and tried to calm myself. "Aqua eructo isn't working. Do you know what's wrong?" I asked the man after a few minutes. Even with that bit of irresponsibility with the fiendfyre, he was still the one I trusted the most when it came to teaching me magic.

"Hmmm" He said while stroking his beard. At that point, I'm sure that if I had any Kryptonian powers, I'd have burned a whole through his canvas with my stare.

"Some people just aren't suited for some elements. Mastering all of them is practically unheard of. Maybe you've hit your limit with water manipulation" He said after a few minutes. I'd already considered that, but it wasn't my preferred answer by any means. I had fantasies of sweeping aside hordes of wizards with a single wave of water and roasting them to death with a bolt of lightning. The fact that I could probably never be able to do that rubbed me the wrong way.

This was actually the first time I'd ever encountered such a hard block in my use of magic. I couldn't say I liked the feeling at all. In fact, I'm very sure I hated it more than anything. Wasn't magic the thing that was supposed to make everything possible? For something to seem impossible even with magic rubbed me the wrong way. I'm sure this might seem like an overreaction based on a single spell, and it might actually be, but the entire experience wasn't a positive one.

I guess I'd grown used to practically limitless exponential growth in my magical ability. I knew the growth would slow down eventually, but I hadn't expected it to happen so soon.