Chapter 27: The Fourth Champion

Moody's first DADA lesson burrowed itself into Neville's conscience for quite some time after that. It made him wonder if Ron was right – that Moody had gotten across the point of his lesson, unorthodox as it was. What disturbed Neville all the more, though, was what the lesson implied: did Aurors use the same low tactics that Death Eaters did? Did the people who were supposed to be the 'good guys' rely on the same tricks that their enemies did, even in war? Rules of engagement aside, Neville had to conclude that torture was torture, no matter which side was wielding the wand. Doubtless Hermione would agree with him. So would little Harry, for that matter, for how viscerally he had reacted to Moody's use of Crucio.

By the time the Halloween Feast arrived, the castle was abuzz with excitement. Dumbledore at least did not leave the students in suspense for long over who would be put forward for glory, and the Goblet of Fire was only happy to oblige. One at a time, the magical object spat both fire and charred pieces of parchment – three in all – which Dumbledore caught and read. One Champion from each school.

"The Champion from Hogwarts….. is Cedric Diggory!"

There was instant hoopla from the Hufflepuff table, a wide circle of friends manhandling the Seeker on the Hufflepuff Quidditch team in victory.

"The Champion from Beauxbatons…. is Fleur Delacour!"

The girls from Beauxbatons were sharing meals with the Gryffindors, much to the delight of the boys from that House. High-pitched squealing and chittering in French descended around one girl who Neville had to admit was the most beautiful of the lot. Fleur's smile may have been slightly smug, though she was obviously pleased.

"The Champion from Durmstrang…. is Viktor Krum!"

Grunts and throaty yells from the large brood of men currently bunking with the Ravenclaws. Ron looked like he was about to have a stroke from sheer excitement.

"Krum versus Diggory?! And I don't have to pay a single Galleon to see it! – though I would," he amended, thrilled by the match-up.

"Well, I think that Fleur will make a strong showing!" Hermione declared.

"Want to lay a little wager then?" Ron's eyes gleamed at her.

Hermione let out something of a squeak. "I beg your pardon, Ronald! I'm not a gambling sort of girl!"

Ron shrugged. "Suit yourself."

Suddenly, another WHOOSH of flame made all the conversations die down, as gasps and even a few cries of shock went up. Dumbledore was drifting towards the Goblet warily, watching with concern as the magical object seemed to be going plumb daffy. Then a fourth, charred piece of parchment was listing down on the air, into Dumbledore's outstretched hand.

"Neville Longbottom….. NEVILLE LONGBOTTOM!"

Dead silence had fallen over all assembled. Neville himself was rooted to his seat on the Gryffindor bench, and it was only an insistent nudging into the small of his back from Hermione that made him move.

"Neville…. Neville, for goodness sake - !"

He stood on unsteady feet, conducting a kind of death march between the Gryffindor and Ravenclaw tables. If he had turned around to take in his classmates and friends, he might have noticed a weirdly dark look come over Ron's features, which, caught in the goblet's firelight, made him look rather ghoulish.

He was nearly at the end of the table's length before anyone dared to say a word.

"He's a cheat!" someone threw out from his left.

"He's not even of age yet!" called another.

Folded into himself, Neville kept his head bowed until he reached Dumbledore. He only grew more terrified when he looked up into the face of the Headmaster and found nothing immediately readable in his expression. Dumbledore merely pointed to a side door, through which the other three Champions had already been ushered, to perhaps discuss next steps privately.

Neville trudged to the door slowly, though his mind was screaming at his feet to run, and in the opposite direction. He had absolutely no idea what had happened.

Once past the door, he ascended a deep staircase down into a low-ceilinged room, featuring a fireplace at one end. Huddled around the hearth, Cedric started a little upon seeing Neville walk through. Fleur let out what might have been a haughty sniff. Viktor Krum's face was a stony mask.

It seemed like many minutes that the four young people were left alone, staring at each other, or more specifically at the interloper in their midst. Finally, a cacophony of shouting could be heard, as Dumbledore, Tournament organizer Bartimaeus Crouch, the Headmasters of Beauxbatons and Durmstrang, and half the Hogwarts staff poured into the room.

"Neville! Neville:" Dumbledore made right for the Boy Who Lived, and Neville was disturbed to find that he had never seen the Headmaster of Hogwarts look so wild, so deranged, so….. angry. "Did you put your name in that Goblet of Fire?!"

"No, sir!" and he damn near squeaked it.

"Did you ask an older student to submit it for you?!" Neville felt his shoulders lurching back and forth and he realized it was because Dumbledore was shaking him, nearly out of his skin.

"No, sir!"

At the rear of the main group of adults, Severus Snape's voice carried forward. "I can subject the boy to Veritaserum, Headmaster, if you wish. We can gain answers more efficiently that way, without any need for investigation."

Neville tried not to pale, fearing how incriminating that might appear, even as he had nothing to hide. "Verita….what?"

"Truth telling potion," Albus explained, before turning back to his Potions Master with caution. "And that would be only for extreme measures, Severus."

"And vould you not consider this an extreme measure, Dumbledore?" Igor Karkaroff, the Headmaster of Durmstrang, looked positively irate, glaring at Neville with burning indignation. "The boy must have done something to tamper with it!"

"Peace, Igor. I'm sure there's an explanation." And Dumbledore's gaze swiveled back down to Neville's, a kind of imploring there, except Neville was just as lost as the brilliant Headmaster was.

"Albus…." Minerva McGonagall stepped forward kindly. "You wisely placed the most prudent wards imaginable around the Goblet. If even the Weasley twins themselves couldn't fool it…."

"Too right, Minerva," Severus interrupted. "If the cleverest students in the school by half couldn't trick an ancient magical object, what makes you think this boy could have?" Even as he finished McGonagall's thought, Severus's rhetorical inquiry held a far more condescending tone. Neville curled into himself, even as he felt a wellspring of anger bubbling up. Severus had left the implication behind his words unspoken, but it was still there: Neville knew how there were certain corners of this school who still thought him incapable of defeating Voldemort, never mind allegedly fooling an ancient magical artifact like the Goblet of Fire. People still wondered whether or not the Boy Who Lived was actually a Squib who had gotten lucky.

This moment right now, however, hardly felt like luck, and Neville found it excruciating to meet any of the accursing stares. Only McGonagall and Dumbledore seemed to show any sympathy, and while Mad-Eye Moody's scrutiny wasn't hateful or suspicious, it was still disconcertingly curious. Intrigued.

"Bartimaeus: surely this cannot stand? Four Champions?! Absurd!" Karkaroff was accosting the Tournament director, and only halted when Crouch sharply held up a finger for silence, whilst he deliberated.

Crouch turned towards Neville and all assembled slowly, and Neville's heart sank like a stone. He would have gladly accepted the Tournament director declaring a mis-selection, or whatever the term might be, and they could all view this as an error, a misunderstanding.

From the anguish on Crouch's face, however, it appeared he was somehow boxed in. "The Goblet of Fire is absolute. We have no choice…. Neville Longbottom must compete."

"How did you do it?" Ron's question was immediate and whining in its tone the moment Neville dragged himself into their dormitory.

He almost asked 'Do what?,' then thought better of it. It wouldn't do to play dumb, and it fact, in some quarters, it might only make things worse. He decided to go with the truth, which was….

"I didn't do it."

"Bollocks," Ron snorted.

The disbelief coming from his best mate burned, grated, and Neville let a little frustration seep into his voice. "I didn't ask for this to happen, Ron! OK? You and your idiot twin brothers were the ones disappointed that we aren't age-eligible, not me! You're being stupid….."

Wrong thing to say, as Ron scooted onto his four-poster bed, blue eyes clouded by a sneer. "Yeah – everyone jump on Ron Weasley, Neville Longbottom's stupid friend."

The resentment in Ron's tone was clear as day, yet Neville did not know the first thing about how to address it. "Just…. go to sleep, yeah?" He flopped down onto his own pillow, utterly drained.

Though he did flinch when he heard, just before drifting into slumber, how Ron muttered something that sounded like, "Piss off."

A man with less shame might have cackled with glee at what had just transpired. All the same, Severus kept such thoughts of schadenfreude to himself, mostly out of a sense of duty to his chosen side, if not necessarily out of any concern or attachment to the lad. Where Neville Longbottom was concerned, he had none.

He slipped by the night-owl wards at St. Mungo's with the barest minimum of awareness, the actions so practiced and rote by now, he could do it in his sleep. It afforded him more focus to ponder what had occurred this night, and what it could portend.

Severus knew well the rumors, the wonderings, that Neville Longbottom was actually a Squib. The interactions he had had with the boy in classes involved potions, not wand work – in the art of potion-making, there was pretty much no wand work involved. So certainly, he had almost never seen any evidence of magical ability from the boy that would speak to the contrary, and the one instance he had – that infernal Dueling Club Lockhart had started to cover his own lack-of-credentials ass – had left much to be desired. Draco had acted arrogantly in that fight, casting wild, which was the only reason why that scrimmage had ended in something of a draw.

But if the rumors were true, then of one thing Severus was certain: in this Tournament, Neville Longbottom was going to get absolutely crushed. The Triwizard Tournament (something of a misnomer now, with four champions) was all about skill, and here was a mere fourth-year, expected to go up against two older, highly talented Quidditch players of both professional and Hogwarts-level playing background. Severus didn't bother to speculate on the Delacour girl's chances; indeed, she might be the one thing that ensured Longbottom didn't get drummed out of the Tournament firmly in last place.

Were it not for the fact that the boy was, whatever the speculation about his magical ability or lack thereof, the Boy Who Lived and therefore highly prized by Dumbledore, Severus might have decided to pass the Tournament laughing his arse off, and maybe even placing a few conservative bets in favor of Longbottom's opponents. As it was, he decided he would continue to keep his misgivings of the Tournament to himself….

… after, of course, confiding them to Lily. She might get some amusement out of it. Or maybe she would feel sympathy for the boy and thus give Severus's conscience more room in his heart.

Sweeping into Lily's sickroom, he felt a pang of disappointment to discover she was fast asleep. Odd. She usually waited up for him. Though the bedside lamp was still on, well past lights out. Sighing, he crossed to the small utility chair at her bedside and tugged it closer. He reached a hand out to softly brush the auburn bangs back from her forehead, before turning to the Jane Austen book carefully closed and balanced on the side table. Opening it and removing the bookmark, he backtracked to an earlier chapter and began to read, if for no other reason than to catch up. He and Lily had been reading together and then talking about what they read. As a matter of reading comprehension, it was primary school in its difficulty level. As a matter of testing her memory, both short and even some long-term, it was proving to be invaluable.

It was clear she had read ahead, Severus's lips quirked with amusement. He supposed he could skip ahead, but he wouldn't put it past his Lillian to catch him at it and admonish him for not reading all the way through. So he settled in and scanned the words on the page until his eyelids grew heavy with sleep.