CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
This is JKR's sandbox, sadly.
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
-o0o0o0o-
Narcissa was pacing through the family room of Potter Manor. It had become the impromptu meeting area for family meetings.
If Sirius Black wasn't so worried, he'd make a joke that there will be a hole in the tiled floor soon enough with the way she was frantically walking back and forth.
He and Lucius exchanged worried glances as they watched her. Remus Lupin entered with Frank and Alice right behind him.
Cassie, Arcturus, Melania, Pollux, Andromeda, Ted, and Dora walked in only moments after.
"What's this about, Cissa?" Andromeda asked softly, seeing a letter clutched in her sister's hand.
"The boys think that someone's impersonating Mad-Eye." Lucius answered for her.
Dora seemed to jump up for a moment, eyes growing wide in what Sirius could only see as realisation.
"What is it, Dora?" Sirius asked quickly.
"It makes sense." She said faintly. "He's been acting strange since just after the World Cup."
"Are you sure?" Ted asked his daughter.
"He's always been strange, even when Charlus and I trained his group of Aurors when he was just a sprout." Arcturus added.
"I know my mentor, Grandfather." Dora murmured. "His mannerisms, his memory even. Outwardly if you don't know him, it will seem the same, but it's not."
"Why do the boys think it's an imposter?" Melania asked gently.
"He performed the unforgivables in a classroom." Narcissa spat, fuming.
Everyone tensed.
"What?" Remus Lupin asked, his voice dangerously low and his eyes flashing amber. Those vile awful spells, in a classroom near his cub? Near his cubs.
"And he's going to place them all under the imperius curse. To teach them how to resist it." Lucius added.
"We have to fight against this!" Melania nearly shouted, eyes wide.
"We must work in the shadows." Pollux said. "We cannot spook him. If he's with Voldemort, we can gauge his plans and gain information."
"The boys know that, I assume?" Cassie said, and Narcissa nodded distractedly.
"And, resisting the imperius is a good skill." Arcturus added. "We couldn't do that because of the trace on those spells, but assuming fake Moody got permission from Albus and the Ministry..it's good training." He was loath to admit it.
The rest nodded. "Yes, I'll pen them back, telling them not to do anything rash. We can use this to our advantage." Sirius murmured, already drafting a letter with a quill and parchment nobody had any idea how he got so quickly.
-o0o0o0o-
Since Harry got the 'do not engage unless threatened' letter from Sirius, nothing interesting has happened. But it was time for their DADA lesson, despite knowing that Moody was not actually Moody, they were excited.
They wanted to see how much willpower they would have, if they would be able to throw off the Imperius Curse.
"Do you think you can?" Draco asked the group as they filed into their classroom. Harry shrugged.
"Honestly, I don't know." He answered.
"I know that I wouldn't be able to." Hermione grumbled. Draco snorted.
"Mione, you are quite possibly the most stubborn person I have met. There's no way anyone can make you do something you don't want to." He praised his friend.
Hermione blushed softly and smiled at him. "Thank you."
"For what?" Draco asked, bewildered. "The truth?"
She snorted and shook her head, her brown curls falling in her face.
Harry noticed Theo looking at her, and raised an eyebrow in his direction. Theo simply shook his head.
Interesting. Harry mused. Then, false-Moody walked in. Everyone sat up in attention, watching the man as his eye whirred around taking note of everything in the room.
"Today, with the permission of the Headmaster I will be placing you all under the imperius curse. This is sanctioned and safe, I promise not to make any of you do anything too dangerous." He said, his voice disguised with joy and his eyes alight in excitement.
He called up the kids one by one, making them do ridiculous things like flips, jumps, dances, and jigs.
Only a few hadn't been called up at this point, and surprise surprise, it was the eight of them left.
"Granger, come up." He called, she warily walked forward in front of Moody, who whispered the spell.
"Imperio."
They watched as Hermione's eyes became glazed over.
Jump. A voice whispered in her mind.
Why? She asked back, resisting but only barely. The temptation and urge to jump nearly taking over.
Jump!
No.
I said JUMP!
It screamed in her mind, and her occlumency shields did little to stop it. She ended up jumping, but it was more like a hop, as she stopped herself only slightly.
Moody took the curse off her and looked at her with an appraising look. "You resisted. Nobody has resisted so far in any of the classes I've done. Good job." He praised and she nodded demurely and walked back to her seat.
Everyone's eyes were on her and she seemed to want to disappear. Daphne looked at her sympathetically, and rubbed soothing circles in her best friend's back.
"Zabini!" Moody called, and Hermione's back tensed as she watched one of her closest friends walk up to the man.
Blaise's back was ramrod straight, his face carefully blank.
He was growing to be a very handsome young man, Hermione realised. Blaise had aristocratic features, beautiful dark skin that had no blemishes on it whatsoever, muscles were lining his arms and back. He was tall, and was only going to grow taller. His eyes, however, were an enrapturing light green. His nose was straight, and his cheekbones high.
"Imperio!" Moody cast, and they watched as his eyes glazed over.
Do a backflip.
The voice nearly took over, and Blaise was going to do it, but his own voice stopped him from doing so.
No.
Do a backflip. The other voice urged.
I said, no.
Do it! The voice was shouting in Blaise's mind now.
N-no!
But the warring voices caused Blaise to do the backflip yet also stop himself from doing it. He jumped in the air but stopped his body from going any further, falling on the ground and panting.
"You nearly threw it off." Fake-Moody said in shock.
Blaise said nothing further and just walked back to his seat, grinning.
Theo's attempt was much like Blaise's. He stopped himself from doing the full command that Moody issued to him, but he did not completely throw it off either.
Neville and Draco nearly succeeded in fully throwing it off, but it physically exerted them, and they fell to the floor.
They didn't do the command, didn't listen to the voice. That's what matters. Harry was grinning ear to ear.
Next was Daphne, and hers was like Hermione's.
She resisted valiantly, but ended up succumbing to the words of the voice. They vowed to throw it off the next attempt.
"Potter. Your turn." Fake-Moody's grin was sharklike as the boy-who-lived walked up to him, placing himself so willingly in his grasp.
"Imperio." Harry's mind went blissfully blank for a moment.
Do a cartwheel.
No. Harry's mind sounded like it was amused.
Do a cartwheel.
No.
C'mon, you know you want to.
I don't, actually.
Do. A. Cartwheel!
The voice nearly shouted in Harry's mind, making him almost once.
"I SAID NO!"
Everyone in the class was looking at him, shocked and dumbfounded. Harry shook his head and cleared it from the rest of the fogginess. He looked to the false Moody, who held his wand limply in his hand and stared at Harry in shock.
He threw it off. Completely. Fully.
"Did I..say that out loud?" Harry asked sheepishly as he walked back to his seat.
"You threw it off." Hermione said in shock. "How did you do it?"
"I don't know..I just remained firm, I guess? I didn't want to do a bloody cartwheel."
"Class dismissed." Fake-Moody called gruffly, everyone filed out of the classroom quickly, but Harry felt the magical and real eye glaring a hole into the back of his neck as he walked out without looking back.
-o0o0o0o-
"Harry threw off the imperius in the first class!" Remus exclaimed proudly, thrusting the letter to be shared around. "The rest of the kids all managed by their third class."
"We've raised some strong willed children," Narcissa smiled softly.
"And they made friends with other strong willed children." Andromeda added, her voice tinged with fondness as she thought of the rowdy group of children that she could never get to listen to her.
"The tournament will begin soon." Arcturus said gruffly, changing the subject. Sirius' happy mood died nearly instantly.
"The delegates from the other schools will be arriving shortly." He nodded, his voice neutral.
"How badly do you think Dumbledore will mess this up?" Dora asked, snorting softly as she drank her orange juice.
"On a scale of 1-10?" Remus asked the girl, raising a lone eyebrow. She nodded, prompting the older man to go on. He smirked ruefully, his gaze grave. "An eleven."
"Wonderful." She sighed softly.
"We're going to have to be on guard." Melania murmured, speaking for the first time in hours. Her eyes were stricken and fear was written on her face. She was always very emotive. "Something is brewing. I feel it."
"We'll take care of it, grandmother." Andromeda said softly.
"Let's hope so." She whispered softly, her gaze distant and her face vacant.
-o0o0o0o-
Durmstrang and Beauxbatons were arriving today, and Harry could not be more excited.
For one, Viktor Krum is a student and Durmstrang, and the bloke can fly. Harry watched him like a hawk during the World Cup, and the talent was indescribable.
And, their new friend Fleur Delacour would be arriving with the french school as well, and though she and the group had exchanged consistent letters, he had grown quite fond of the fiery veela.
He and his friends stood outside in the cold, taking turns watching the sky and the lake, when the carriage was spotted.
The winged abraxan-horses were magnificent as they landed elegantly on the ground before them. The students of beauxbatons were beautiful, none could deny that. Dainty, sharp features, inquisitive eyes, and…well, they were french.
The Durmstrang ship rose up from the lake afterwards, the boys at school in awe as they watched the militaristic and intimidating features of the students of the other school.
Dumbledore and the other headmasters greeted one another, and Harry watched with narrowed eyes as he stared at Igor Karkaroff.
"Harry?" Hermione whispered softly. "Why are you looking at him like that?"
"He was a death eater." Neville answered for him, his own hazel gaze narrowed in one the man.
"Not only was he a death eater, he was a rat too." Draco said, his voice filled with venom.
"He sold them out though, isn't that good?" Hermione asked, biting her lower lip nervously.
"He did it to save his skin." Harry muttered. "He was on their side firmly until things got ugly. There's fewer things in this world worse than a death eater and a rat. And he and Peter Pettigrew are both of those things."
Hermione's blood filled with ice as she saw Karkaroff's gaze on Harry.
Breaking protocol quite obviously, Fleur ran to her British friends the moment she spotted them.
"Harry!" She called, going after the one that saved her first before greeting the others. Harry's distant and cloudy gaze cleared the moment he heard the familiar voice with the heavy accent.
"Fleur!" He called back, greeting her with a tight hug. She smiled as she hugged and greeted the others.
The Hogwarts student body was gaping, not just at them, but at Fleur. Her allure was something many had no resistance to. Madame Maxime was glaring at her star student.
"Harry?" A gruff voice echoed, his voice laced with realisation. The man had a thick accent, and when Harry turned around, he stood face to face with Viktor Krum. "As in..Harry Potter?"
Harry tenseed, only barely. "Yes," Harry nodded in acknowledgement. "You're Viktor Krum, I was at your game during the Cup."
"Da," Viktor said, offering a hand out to the younger boy in front of him. "Nice to meet you."
Harry's lips turned up slightly. "Nice to meet you too." And he took the hand of the older boy, and shook it firmly.
-o0o0o0o-
The Halloween feast occurred with the regular festivities and it was as vivacious and high-spirited as it always was at Hogwarts.
Harry didn't care much for Halloween. For obvious reasons. But he sat with the Slytherins and the delegation from Durmstrang, as the students from Beauxbatons sat at the Ravenclaw table.
According to Neville, Hermione, and the twins, the Gryffindors, specifically Ronald Weasley and his ilk were very offended and upset that Viktor Krum had chosen to sit with the "slimy snakes" over the brave, honourable lions.
If Harry hadn't been so annoyed, he would have laughed. Truth be told, Harry and all of his friends had been on edge the entire day leading up to the feast, when the names would be picked.
Harry chalked it up to Cedric and Fleur deciding to put their names in regardless, but he had a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. It felt as if his stomach was turning inside out, churning with a sense of foreboding settling over him.
"Now that we are all fed and watered!" Dumbledore boomed from the podium, his voice enhanced with a minor sonorus charm. "It is time for the Goblet to pick the champions!"
The tranquil, blue, swirling fire now turned into a vivacious, thundering red as the first name was spat out with an only slightly singed piece of parchment. "And the Durmstrang Champion is..Viktor Krum!" The man called out.
Everyone in the hall, specifically the Durmstrang students erupted in applause and cheers. As Viktor was sitting next to Harry, the boy shot the eighteen year old a grin and shook his hand. "Congratulations, Viktor."
Viktor inclined his head in thanks, with a secret smile that his Headmaster could not see.
The Goblet once more began to flare up as another piece of barely singed parchment flew out elegantly. "The Beauxbatons champion is…Fleur Delacour!"
There were less cheers for the girl, of course as many people were either jealous of her, or thought her snobby. But her friends at Gryffindor and Slytherin, and one specific boy at Hufflepuff were cheering for her the loudest. She smiled at them, her body filling up with excitement.
"And the Hogwarts champion is…" Dumbledore called out, pausing only slightly more for suspense, everyone on the edge of their seats. "Cedric Diggory!"
There was pandemonium in the Great Hall as everyone congratulated the most popular and well-liked boy in the school, by all houses, students, and teachers.
"Champions, please report to the–" Dumbledore stopped short as the Goblet once more flared up, this one more angry and vigorous seeming than the others.
A chill settled in Harry's bones, and he watched as the twins, Hermione, and Neville were shoving their way to him through the mass of people, Fleur and Cedric following close behind.
Draco's arm was around his shoulders and Daphne was squeezing his hand in disbelief. His eyes closed.
No. Please no. Whatever God or Goddess or deity is up there–
"Harry Potter." Dumbledore whispered, disbelief coating his words.
Whispers erupted through the great hall instantly. "Harry Potter." He called louder.
Harry stood up, defiance in his gaze. He would fight this every step of the way.
"Expecto Patronum." He cast softly, and a glowing, beautiful and regal stag popped out of his wand, waiting for his command and on alert for danger. "Sirius, Arcturus, or all of you. Get to Hogwarts immediately, my name has come out of the Goblet of Fire."
The stag bounded away until it was just an old echo of white, silvery wisps of ethereal magic.
He walked to Dumbledore, his head held high and his face was pure stone.
Everyone held their breaths. Some knew that Harry had no idea. It was only obvious for those that saw the momentary shock on his face, followed by stone-faced resignation.
Ronald Weasley scoffed. "He's a cheat!" He shouted in the silent hall, disrupting what felt like a moment frozen in time.
Harry and the other Champions ignored him, Cedric shooting worried looks at Harry, the boy refusing to look anywhere except ahead.
The Headmasters and Professors of Hogwarts followed them frantically.
"Harry." Dumbledore asked calmly, his eyes for once did not hold that infuriating twinkle. "Did you put your name in the Goblet of Fire."
"No." Harry spat defiantly, glaring at the man.
"But of course he is lying!" The half-giant woman spat, her french accent nearly as heavy as her outrage.
"No he is not!" Fleur countered, managing to stomp her foot daintily with a glare painted on her perfect face.
Viktor observed with a quiet neutrality.
"Everyone who knows Harry would know he didn't do this." Cedric agreed, pleading with his head of house to back him up.
Pomona Sprout sighed. "We have no way to prove it."
"He's only fourteen!" McGonagall argued. "He cannot compete! You have to fix this." The fierce Scottish woman was frothing at the mouth with rage on Harry's behalf. His heart softened for a moment, before he hardened once more.
"I'm not going to compete in this stupid tournament, Dumbledore."
"Watch how you speak to the Headmaster, boy." Snape spat at him. Harry reared up to his full height, glaring. Fury was coming off the boy in waves and his eyes eerily glowing emerald green.
"It is because of the esteemed headmaster and his lacklustre security that I am in this mess in the first place, Snape."
Snape opened his mouth to harshly state his rebuttal, but Barty Crouch intervened.
"The Goblet of Fire is a sentient magical artefact. Despite Mr. Potter not putting his name of his own volition–as he has stated–his name still exited." He said, his voice grave.
"No." Harry whispered, denial and disbelief coating his voice.
"I'm afraid so," Barty sighed softly. "He must participate in the tournament, or he will either lose his magic..or his life."
The door burst open.
-o0o0o0o-
The silence in the hall was palpable as people began processing what just happened. Tension already formed even worse between Slytherin and the other Houses.
People were beginning to glare at others, but they watched as Harry's friends were whispering with one another, frantically conversing.
"This cannot be bloody happening." Blaise Zabini groaned, worry was coating his face.
"I need to talk to Mum, or Dad..or..I don't know!" Neville spat. "Surely there must be a loophole?"
"No." Hermione shook her head. "I read about the Goblet. It's sentient magic. It's basically a magical oath. He has to compete."
"Who the fuck would put his name in the Goblet?" George muttered, anger coating his face.
"Shit." Draco breathed, eyes wide. "Shit shit shit!"
"What is it?" Daphne demanded, looking at one of her best friends sternly.
"Fake-Moody." Draco breathed.
"That must be what he was here for." Neville muttered, connecting the dots.
"But what would he get out of it? Putting Harry in the tourney?" Fred asked, eyes wide, knowing the answer but not wanting to believe it.
"People die in this tournament." Theo choked, eyes wide. The breath left their lungs in an instant.
The Great Hall doors opened, a fierce group of people barging in. Every student felt the power and fury exuding off of the people in waves as they stormed in.
"Sirius!" Neville called in relief, running to the man in the centre, the friends following suit.
The student body of Hogwarts have heard about the Potter-Black-Longbottom-Malfoy family, but they had never seen them in person.
These were the fiercest, most battle hardened warriors of the last generation. The best of the best that had survived. The most cunning, the most terrifying.
"Neville." Sirius said softly, hugging the boy. "Where is he?"
"In the antechamber right by the hall. The teacher's meeting area." Hermione answered softly.
Arcturus stormed through the halls, in front of every member of the family by seniority.
Every single student, Hogwarts or not, felt chills down to the very bone as they heard the scream of the battle-hardened ex Lord Black.
The man that fought Grindelwald, was one of his fiercest enemies. The man that made everyone in the Wizengamot fear him.
The man who people revere and respect.
"Dumbledore!" His voice echoed through the hall. Everyone filed closer to the antechamber, trying to hear everything as they heard voices speaking through a crack in the door.
"You better have a damn good explanation as to why my grandson's name was entered into the Goblet." Arcturus Black growled.
For generations to come, people would talk about how the revered and powerful Albus Dumbledore, stuttered horribly trying to answer Arcturus Black.
a/n: heheh finally the fun will really begin. I'm so excited for this you guys, you have no idea. It's taken forever to get to this point, but I promise you from here on out everything will be much more fun. Please review and tell me what you think of this chapter. Soon enough, we shall be continuing with the horcrux hunt! Please review with feedback, or ideas! I'd love to incorporate your guys' ideas in this story as well so everyone can enjoy reading it as much as I enjoy writing it! See you soon! Xoxo