Chapter 3: A Taste of Brilliance

The girl, or woman or physical manifestation of the castle's desire to help students was an absolutely brilliant teacher. I hadn't accepted her offer to read my mind and essentially steal all my knowledge, but it still felt like she totally understood me. She always explained things in ways easy to understand and gave really good advice.

For example, she suggested an approach in transfiguration which somehow ended up with me being the first to manage the transfiguration we were supposed to do in class. The method was really simple, instead of transfiguring the whole object or animal you could start with one end and work your way through, if you could do this quickly enough, it wouldn't look any different to a normal transfiguration. McGonagall gave me a good twenty points to Gryffindor and I silently thanked the gi…woman for her advice.

Not everything she taught me had such impacts however. Most of the spells she taught me were mostly about accomplishing simple tasks, summoning, banishing and blowing things up. Blowing things up must have been something she really enjoyed in her day because I had learnt more spells for blowing things up than I could count. My favourite was the spell which destroyed magical shields. I had used that one on Greengrass' cauldron in potions class and finally gained my retribution for her earlier stunt.

I realised that all spells had uses, but I couldn't quite justify learning a spell to crack eggs when I could be learning how to fight or how to transfigure a rock into a wolf. Frustrated was the word which fit the best, but I had to acknowledge that the girl knew what she was doing. She was incredibly stubborn however and never relented to teach me something I asked to learn.

As was customary, I arrived to class early and took my seat at the back of Moody's classroom. As I waited for the class to begin, I picked up a book the girl had implored me to read and tried to get started. It was almost ridiculous what stupid things she had me do, this book was not even about magic or even infromational in any form. It was a fiction book, a muggle fiction book. What was I supposed to learn when reading that? I trusted the girl though and hoped that she had some kind of brilliant plan in place. However, I found that my bottle of trust for her was drying up with each day.

I heard the usual rhythm of clanking and thudding which meant Moody was walking and I looked up to see him standing in front of my table.

"I want to see you in my office at six tonight, alright Potter?" Moody barked out.

"Yes sir," I responded evenly and put my book back inside my bag.

Hermione entered the classroom together with Ron, Seamus and Dean and ignored me completely. She took a seat together with them at the front and I couldn't help but feel a pang in my chest as I looked at them. I missed them. I couldn't help but regret pushing them away. Ron had been a prat but Hermione had wanted to help me and I went way over the line.

"Will our friendship ever be the same it was before?" I thought to myself solemnly.

We had been close friends for over three years but the longer our time at odds became, the more it felt like something was different from previous fights. I sighed as Neville sat down next to me again and prepared for what would probably be a very eventful but uninteresting lesson.

-()-

I looked at the Marauder's map to ensure I was alone in the corridor and flung my invisibility cloak off myself before I knocked at Moody's office door. I still wasn't sure why he had called me here tonight, I definitely didn't think this would be a detention. Hearing a gruff voice answer 'come in' I opened the door curiously and stepped inside. The entire office was lined with shelves along the walls, except for a large trunk next to the door. All the shelves were packed with different metal objects with their uses being very ambiguous. I sat down in the seat in front of his desk and tried to not squirm too much under his very intense gaze.

"Has Hagrid told you about the task?" Moody barked out suddenly, almost making me jump in surprise.

"No;" I answered hesitantly.

"Aye, the task is dragons, thought Hagrid could tell you but it seems I have to," Moody muttered.

My mind reeled. Dragons? Dragons? The single most dangerous magical creature on earth? That was what they thought was fitting for a bunch of wizards not even out of school yet should face?

"We have to defeat a dragon?" I asked, my voice wavering slightly.

"No, only steal something from it."

"Only steal something?" I asked incredulously.

"Yes. Now, do you have a plan to deal with this?"

"I had a general plan, but I guess we could tweak it a little now." I cursed inwardly, hoping that Moody didn't notice my slip of tongue.

"What is it?"

I looked Moody in the eye and smirked. "That would be telling."

Moody looked as if he was going to curse me into oblivion but instead he just burst out laughing.

"Okay lad, but if I could give you one piece of advice. Play to your strengths."

After that he quickly dismissed me and I wandered back towards the now very familiar corridor on the fourth floor. Moody's advice was very surprising, and also opened a lot of questions. The rules of the tournament stated that no teacher could interfere or help a champion in any way, so how could Moody possibly have gone around this? And if he could do it, shouldn't someone as powerful and wise as Dumbledore be able to do it as well?

-()-

"Eleven inches long, made of holly and a phoenix feather as a core. This is one of my own," Mr Ollivander muttered as he was examining my wand. We were officially a week from the first task and as such the weighing of wands ceremony was in full swing. Getting all the champions in one room had been a problem of its own due to the amount of students turned bodyguards who now resided within the castle, but it worked out in the end.

Ollivander conjured a bouquet of flowers and declared my wand to be in excellent condition. I had assumed that that would be it for the ceremony but afterwards I had to endure a long, excruciating photo shoot. Not only did we have to do individual photos, but we also needed to do photos in a group and with our respective headmasters. Since Hogwarts now had two champions and Dumbledore only were allowed to represent one, McGonagall was the one I took a photo with. I had never seen my head of house looking so incredibly uncomfortable before, I would probably have laughed if I wasn't sure to land in a month of detention.

It was after the photography session that things took an interesting turn. I was just about to leave the event for good when I was forced inside a broom cupboard by a jubilant Ludo Bagman. Inside, I found a very peculiar looking woman who introduced herself as Rita Skeeter. The smell of very strong perfume permeated through the room and I felt my ability to breathe becoming restricted. A flying piece of parchment and an accompanying green quill was what took my attention however. It was hovering in the air and writing something down furiously, although I had no idea what.

"Is it alright if I use a 'Quick Quotes Quill'?" she asked sweetly.

I didn't actually know what a 'Quick Quotes Quill' was so I accepted but immediately regretted it as a malicious glimt appeared in her eyes. The following interview was incredibly frustrating as she asked the most irrelevant of questions and the quill misquoted everything I said heavily. I wondered if it was possible to sue her for that, it should at least be allowed if she actually wrote the statements as a quote in an article, right?

"How do you feel about your friends abandoning you in this difficult time? Do you think they have finally shown their true colours?" Skeeter asked placetingly.

I just stood up, looked at her in disgust and stormed off, totally ignoring Diggory's wave, Delacour's scowl and Karkaroff's muttering about my supposed insolence. As was common right now, I quickly made my way towards the fourth floor and stormed inside the room.

"You seem calm," the girl remarked.

I just took a deep breath and tried to calm down.

"Let's just say that I dislike journalists from now on."

The girl just raised her eyebrows and responded, "Who did this journalist insult? Your friends? Your parents? Your friend's parents?" the girl asked, clearly not impressed with my tantrum.

"Just my friends…. Wait, how did you know what happened?" I asked suspiciously.

"You are about as easy to read as a book made for five year olds."

"Well, if you're not going to help, I might as well leave," I muttered and took a step towards the door.

I was interrupted by the girl speaking, "I want to ask you a favour."

I turned around furiously and spat out, "You insult me. Then you want me to help you. What a good plan!"

"Your tendency to abandon rational thought when emotional is most dissatisfactory," was the answer I received.

I blinked in surprise. "You should use more formal language," I said sarcastically.

"At one point you must learn that your own emotions should never dictate your decisions. Alas, that is a problem for another day." she continued as if she hadn't heard me.

The approach this girl took to make me do something really was special, insult me once, ask for something and then insult me again. I knew the girl was right though, it wasn't good to be overly emotional and let your anger steer you, but she didn't have to be so blunt about it.

"What do you want? Another problem which needs to be rectified?" I ground out.

"I want a vial of your blood"

I stared at her incredulously. "You could've just taken my blood when I was knocked out cold if you wanted it, what do you even need it for?"

"This space demands a magical signature in here at all times to force this space to stay active," she answered simply.

Looking at her blankly, I sighed and sat down in my armchair heavily.

"Please explain without the super smart words please," I demanded tiredly.

"When you exit this room I cease to exist. When you enter again, I begin to exist again. If you leave the room for one hour and then return, it will appear to me as if you were only gone for a moment. Every time that door closes behind you, it opens immediately after in my point of view."

"So you're time travelling?"

"No, not even close. This room and in extension, me, just disappear when we are not needed and then reappear when we are needed again. This room may have been here for hundreds of years, but to me it has only felt like a few hours. Most of that time was spent with you."

"So why do you need my blood?" I asked hesitantly.

Blood was something of importance, even I knew that. I had once heard Hermione complaining about wizards signing things in blood, apparently it was 'barbaric'. A sentiment I couldn't help but share.

"We will trick the room that there is always someone in here, one vial should be enough to fool it. In that way I can research and prepare lessons when you are outside of this room…I also want to be free from this horrible kind of existence" the girl explained.

"Okay, but that doesn't explain why you couldn't have taken it earlier," I pointed out.

"Giving things willingly makes a difference," was all she said.

I contemplated her words. Did I trust the girl? Not really. She had never done anything to harm me and had promised to help me with the task. I couldn't give her my memories, but perhaps I could save her from her life trapped inside the room with no free time whatsoever.

"I'll do it," I eventually responded decisively.

The process of extracting the blood was not complicated at all, she just put her wand at my arm and my blood literally flowed through my skin into a vial she conjured. It was as if an invisible vein leading into the bottle had been created. It was very disconcerting watching your own blood flow from your own body in that manner.

After she was finished she went inside the one room I had never been inside before. It was very small compared to the other rooms but also significantly colder, this room gave me a bad feeling. The room was circular like the other rooms but the diameter couldn't have been more than two metres. There was an altar in the middle where an ancient looking book with the letters R.R written in purple was just laying. The roof wasn't like all the others rooms either, it was entirely made of silver and it looked as if several tubes and wires ran through and into each other which then all connected with the door. The girl just placed the vial beside the book and walked out. The door and I sighed in content as warmth once started to emanate through the room.

"Thank you Potter," the girl thanked and gave me a curt nod. "This will help more than you can understand, I believe you will make short work of the first task," she continued.

She still refused to talk about the plan she had decided on though. She claimed it was incredibly effective and that it wouldn't work if I knew beforehand. Knowing the plan beforehand would be greatly preferable though, or so I argued. Especially when we actually knew what we were supposed to do, steal something from a dragon. I trusted her enough on this though, she had made my grades skyrocket seemingly effortlessly and I couldn't help always wanting to know more. Sure, there were some truly useless things I had to learn, she even admitted so herself, but the pros more than justified the cons.

I had never been the studious type but I felt myself absorbing knowledge like a sponge absorbing water.

-()-

I woke up in my dormitory slightly queasy. This reminded me of waking up the morning of a big quidditch game, but ten times worse. It was the day before the first task and I was a wreck. I had to take my jumper on two times because I took it on at the wrong end at first. Neville would have appeared graceful next to me at breakfast, my clumsiness knocked over more jars than I want to admit.

Unfortunately, I hadn't been excused from classes that day so I was forced to sit through Binn's lecture on goblin rebellions when I could've prepared for what could turn out to be fatal. If it wasn't for the wrath of my housemates I probably would have skipped classes altogether this past week, but I really didn't need my own house to completely turn against me.

I was the first one out of Trelawney's tower after the last lesson before lunch. I practically ran to lunch to then shove a small meal down my throat and depart once again. The library was entirely empty as I got there and I quickly made my way towards the section on dragons and began to peruse the section. I must have been here a million times this past week, it felt like I knew more about dragons than I knew about humans at this point.

Finding a good, secluded spot was usually difficult, but not now when everybody was at lunch. After about fifteen minutes of reading a thick tomb about Welsh Green's I was disturbed in my reading by Hermione and Ron finding me. I saw them walking towards me hesitantly, but I didn't look up as they arrived at my table.

"Yes?" I demanded irritatedly when they had just stood silently at my place for a while without saying anything.

Hermione chewed her cheek and Ron looked everywhere but at me and I sighed in annoyance.

"We just wondered if you needed some help with preparing," Hermione began hesitantly. "I know we haven't been the best of friends lately, we should have helped you earlier, but…" Hermione trailed off and I shut my book with a bang and finally looked up at them.

"I don't blame you for not spending time with me, Hermione. I acted just as bad as you did," I declared with a grimace.

I turned to Ron and continued talking, but my voice now held an edge it hadn't had before.

"You still believe I put my name in?" was all I demanded of him.

Ron still didn't meet my eyes as he began stuttering for an answer.

"I… I don't know… I don't see why you would have wanted to sign up for this. This tournament is insane. It's deadly," Ron answered in the end.

I was about to speak up but I was interrupted by Ron continuing his small speech.

"I am sorry though, I shouldn't have left you to the sharks either way,"

My eyes flicked to Hermione for a moment before I looked back at Ron who finally looked me in the eyes.

"I can't say that I just forgive you, but I am willing to be civil once again. Deal?" I offered and held out my hand.

That seemed to be much more than what Ron had hoped for because he quickly grabbed my outstretched hand and shook it firmly.

They both took a seat at chairs around the table and began looking over the books I was doing.

"Dragons? Why do you have so much about dragons?" Hermione asked concernedly.

I quickly filled them in about what Moody had told me in his office. I couldn't help but feel a twinge of happiness again as Hermione immediately started a tirade on how irresponsible the tournament leads were and Ron muttering, "bloody dragons". It was like the good old times.

"Do you have a plan on how to survive?" Ron eventually asked and interrupted Hermione's tirade.

"I do."

They exchanged a look at Hermione pressed on, "So what is it?"

"It's a good one," I said secretly. "You'll find out what it is tomorrow when everybody else does."

"Are you sure it will work? Perhaps a second opinion would see some problems you don't?" Hermione asked as she chewed her cheek.

"I know it will work," I answered confidently. The girl had been brilliant in everything she did, if somebody knew of an easy way to defeat a dragon, it would be her. She knew of spells I had never heard of before. After a look in the library I found out that a spell like the one I used against the cauldron to remove the shield was something entirely unknown. A shield breaker, as she called it, was apparently something only she, and now I, knew how to do.

Hermione looked at me uncertainly and was about to press on further when Ron interrupted her, "Okay then mate, we trust you've got this handled."

After casting a quick glance at a clock I realised that lunch break was nearly over. I quickly gathered my things and we put the books back, then we departed together for another one of Moody's lessons. We just about made it before the lesson started and took the three seats left in the front.

It was good to have them back.

-()-

Escaping from Ron and Hermione hadn't been easy, they seemed intent on making sure that I was safe and sound until the task. It made me feel all warm inside but I had to make an excuse about having to go and make sure that the things I had prepared for the task were ready. that had made them reluctantly let me go. It wasn't really a lie, just not the entire truth.

I checked the Marauders' map to make sure I wasn't being followed and slipped my cloak on. The way to the always abandoned fourth floor corridor was one I knew by heart. I let my feet guide me there and took my cloak off as I entered the familiar space with the purple torch.

The girl was for the first time not actually in the first room, but I found her sitting in the library reading a title about modern history. She professed to have the ability to acquire books by herself. I couldn't deny that it was the case because when I had arrived the morning after giving her the vial of blood she was to be found in the first room with a huge stack of books. There must have been close to a hundred books there, strangely enough both magical and muggle books, some were even works of fiction.

She closed her book as I entered and gestured for me to take a seat in an armchair next to hers. I had noticed a pattern in all the rooms, there was space for working on whatever you needed, but all rooms, except the one for fighting, held a pair of pristine looking dark purple armchairs. I plumped down in front of her and waited for her to speak up.

"There is nothing more you need to know before the task, you learnt the conjunctivus curse before coming here as I asked. You have all the tools you need," the girl explained slowly.

"But I still need the blueprint?" I asked rhetorically.

"You will get the blueprint tomorrow. If you succeed with the task, you will be able to return here. If you do not, I recommend forgetting I exist," she responded seriously.

"Considering that me failing the task most likely equals death, I think that will happen either way," I tried jokingly.

The girl only hummed thoughtfully before continuing, "Your victory will demand a price, whether you pay it is your choice. I suggest you make a good choice, not the right choice."

"It is not as if any innocents will be in danger when I do the task, I would be very surprised if that was the case. Only thing I can pay with is my own blood and bones," I answered solemnly.

"If you say so," was all the girl responded before she pulled something out of her robes. It was a small piece of parchment, entirely blank. It looked like it had been made a second ago, no stains or no signs of use at all.

"The plan will appear on this piece of parchment before the task begins, you will understand what you will have to do then. I am not going to say it is going to be easy, but if you can't do it…" she trailed off.

I looked at the parchment in a new light, this seemingly insignificant piece of parchment held my life in its confines. I had thought a little about what the spells I could do would be able to do against the dragon, the conjunctivus curse being the most useful one. I could see no obvious coherence between them though, but if the plan was so simple that this piece of parchment was enough to explain, I was confident I could do it.

-()-

It was far way past curfew when I returned to the Gryffindor common room and unsurprisingly, Ron and Hermione were half asleep in their armchairs waiting for me. I couldn't help but feel a twinge of annoyance at their antics. They had done a total 180, going from completely ignoring me to obsessing with my well being within a few hours.

I was hoping I could enter and leave for my dormitory without alerting them but that was not meant to be.

"Preparations go well?" Ron asked, trying to sound casual but failing miserably.

"Yes, I need to sleep now," I responded shortly and began walking up the stairs.

"Harry," Hermione called out just as I was out of sight, "Where do you go all the time? To prepare and all.

I turned around and still couldn't see them, but I knew they were waiting with a baited breath.

"Somewhere safe," was all I said before I once again turned on my wheel and went upstairs to sleep. As I was lying in my bed I couldn't help but feel like I had a chunk of concrete in my stomach. It was with the solemn thoughts that this could be my last time sleeping that I finally drifted off to the peacefulness of sleep.