Chapter 3
- Goblet of Fire -
"Now, you sure you've got everything? Clothes? Wand? Books? Have you got your Hogsmeade form?"
"Yes Dad. Like I said five minutes ago, I've got everything."
"Alright, come here." The two stood on the platform, hugging goodbye.
"Dad... you need to let go. The train's going to leave without me."
Remus gave one more squeeze before releasing his son. "I know. Alright, have a great year."
Teddy's suitcase was already in the luggage compartment and the others were all onboard the train. "I'll tell Professor Snape you said, hi." Teddy smirked.
"Off you go, cheeky."
Teddy ran into the train as it began to move out of the station. He gave one last wave from the window before searching the train for his friends. "In here, Ted." Hermione said, waving.
Teddy took a seat next to Hermione, who was stroking her cat lovingly. He spent the first half of the trip staring out the window, watching the grassy hills pass by in green blurs. "Anything from the trolley, dearies." The trolley woman asked as she rolled past.
"Oh," Ron stuffed his hands in his pockets. "A packet of drewballs and a liquorice wand." He looked down at the small amount coins in his hand and sighed. "Actually... just the drewbells."
"It's alright, I'll get it." Harry offered.
"Just the drewballs, please." Ron said sourly. Teddy glanced sideways at Hermione and they exchanged a quiet agreement not to comment on it. Suddenly, a girl walks up to the trolley lady. Teddy noticed Harry's attention had shifted onto the girl. "Two pumpkin pasties please." The girls asked, smiling at Harry for the briefest of seconds. "Thank you."
Harry had stood up, as if to talk to her but she was walking away, followed closely by her friends. "Anything sweet for you?" The trolley woman asked.
"Oh, no thank you. I'm not hungry." He sat back down slowly and Teddy smiled slightly.
"She seems nice," he commented. "What's her name-"
"Cho Chang." Harry replied too quickly.
Hermione was flicking through the Daily Prophet which had a large moving picture of the dark mark on the front page. "This is horrible, how can the ministry not know who conjured it. Isn't there any security or-?"
Ron spoke wit his mouth-full. "Loads according to Dad, that's what worried them so much. Happened right under their noses."
Harry began to rub his forehead.
"It's hurting again isn't it, your scar?" Teddy asked.
"I'm fine."
Hermione leaned forwards towards Harry. "You know Sirius will want to hear about this. What you saw at the world cup, and the dream."
There was a knock on the compartment door. Teddy looked up and turned the colour red. "Who's that?" Ron asked.
"Arkie." Teddy got up and opened the door. "Hey."
"Hey, Teddy." She smiled sweetly. "D'you save me a seat?"
"Of course."
Arkie was already dressed in her Hufflepuff robes and happily took a seat just opposite of Teddy, who had to remind himself not to stare. "Oh, guys this is Arkie. She lives at the orphanage, like me."
"It's nice to meet you." Hermione held out her hand which Arkie shook.
"You too, Teddy's told me so much about you guys."
Teddy had taken a seat opposite of Luna, who had her head buried in a issue of the Quibbler. "Hey, Luna."
"Hello, Teddy. How was your holiday?"
He shrugged. "It had it's ups and downs. How about yours?"
"Pleasantly relaxing."
The sorting ceremony began with the last few students taking their seats. "Hey, Teddy." Arkie whispered and she took her seat at the Hufflepuff table, right behind him.
"Hey." He responded in a whisper.
"Did you see it?" He asked, ignoring how pair of Ravenclaw girls had begun to sit down, but saw him and decided to sit a few seats down.
"You mean the visitors? Yeah. Pretty cool, huh? None of the girls have stopped talking about it since they arrived."
Teddy's mind went back to earlier, when he was standing in the courtyard and the watching five white pegasus' pull a small, yet grand looking carriage across the sky. Next, out of the Black Lake, had risen a large ship that'd sailed towards the shore.
He blinked and was happy to see the sorting ceremony was finished.
"Now that we're all settled in and sorted, I'd like to make an announcement." Dumbledore began after clearing his throat as usual. Teddy's head turned as the doors to the Great Hall opened and Mr Filch came running in, Mrs Norris trotting behind him. "This castle will not only be your home this year but home to some very special guests as well. You see Hogwarts has been chosen..."
Mr Flich whispered something into the Headmaster's ear before he nodded and ran back out of the hall. "So," Dumbledore continued, "Hogwarts has been chosen to host a legendary event. The Tri-Wizard tournament."
Whispers rose among each of the four house tables. Teddy glanced at Luna, but she was still reading and didn't seem to be paying much attention to the Headmaster's speech.
"Now for those of you who do not know, the Tri-wizard tournament brings together three schools for a series of magical contests. From each school a single contestant is selected to compete. Now let me be clear, if chosen you stand alone. And trust me when I say these contests are not for the faint hearted, but more of that later."
Teddy's interest was sparked as the Headmaster motioned to the door of the Great Hall. "For now, please join me in welcoming the lovely ladies of the Beauxbatons Academy of magic and their headmistress Madam Maxime."
The doors opened and girls, dressed in beautiful blue silk dresses, flowed into the room followed by an extremely tall woman. She must've been part giant, she was that tall and Teddy had to remind himself not to stare. The Beauxbatons students twirled in a series of acrobats before facing the students of Hogwarts and sighing dramatically. From their hands, blue butterflies fluttered into the air.
All at once the Hogwarts students clapped loudly, and the boys all stood up in applause whistling. Eventually, everyone was sitting down again.
"And now our friends from the north, please greet the proud sons of Durmstrang and the High Master, Igor Karkaroff."
The doors opened again and boys, carrying long wooden staffs, marched in. Teddy watched as they too put on a performance, throwing their staffs in the air, somersaulting and catching them. Once they reached the end of the hall they performed a wonderful display of fire magic, by summoning a large fiery phoenix that rose above the staff table before disappearing in a puff of smoke. Teddy squinted his eyes at one of the boys that was marching beside Igor.
"No, it can't be."
"What?" Arkie whispered, having heard his gasp.
"That's Viktor Krum, the famous Quidditch player. Ron is gonna love this."
And sure enough, Ron's jaw was hitting the ground as his eyes followed the famous seeker.
Dumbledore raised his wand and magically summoned two more tables for the two schools to sit at. Then the feast began, yet hardly anyone was eating. They were all too excited and too curious about the visitors. "I think I've of heard of the Tri-wizard tournament before." Luna said, in her usual dreamy voice, flipping to the next page of the Quibbler.
"Oh, yeah? What's it like?"
"I heard that the last tournament ended with two competitors being rushed to hospital." Teddy gulped. "Are you planning on competing, Teddy?"
Teddy mumbled something along the lines of, "Not any more." His green eyes glanced up at the staff table and straightened. A new figure, with a familiar dark moustache, was sitting among the teachers. "Hey, I know that guy. That's Barty Crouch, I saw him at the Quidditch World Cup. What's he doing here?"
Luna shrugged and Teddy subconsciously tore his bread roll into small crumbs, an annoying habit he'd developed over the holidays. "You seemed to have developed a disliking for the man." Luna said observantly.
"Well, he did open fire on me and my friends. And suspected me of a crime just because of my lycanthropy. So, I guess we didn't get off on the right foot."
As they feasted, men began to carry something into the Great Hall, placing it in front of the Staff Table. Hundreds of curious eyes looked the object up and down. It was like golden box of a sort, Teddy didn't exactly know how to describe it.
"Your attention please! I would like to say a few words." Dumbledore had stood up again, putting his hand on the gold object. "Eternal glory, that is what awaits the student who wins the Tri-wizard tournament. But to do this that student must survive three tasks. Three extremely dangerous tasks."
Teddy's stomach did another flip. His mind felt like it was split in two. He was in no rush to get himself hurt or killed, but if he did enter the tournament, and by some miracle win, maybe it would help his reputation as both a student and werewolf.
"For this reason the ministry has seen fit to impose a new rule." Teddy focused on the Headmaster again. "To explain all this we have the head of the department of international magic cooperation, Mister Bartimus Crouch."
The broom moustache man stood up, facing the students. As he was doing so, the back door to the Hall opened and a large, square shouldered man peered in. The man was dressed in a long coat and caring a heavy wooden staff, his face was covered in scars. Teddy's father had two long scars down his face, but this man looked as though he'd been slashed by a dragon. One of his brown eyes had even been replaced by a artificial blue one that gazed around the hall quckly.
"Who's that?" Teddy asked no one in particular.
A black haired Ravenclaw boy looked at the man then back at Teddy. "Seriously, Teddy, I thought even you'd know who that is. That's Mad-Eye Moody. You know? The famous Auror."
Teddy ignored the boy's sharp tone. "Alastor Moody? Wait, isn't he the one that, you know...?" He twirled his finger around the side of his forehead as if to say, 'lost his mind'.
"More than half the cells in Azkaban are full because of him. But yeah, wonder what he's doing here?"
Teddy watched as Moody took a step into the room. Suddenly, thunder roared over the Great Hall ceiling and the students screamed as dark clouds appeared above them. Moody pulled out his wand and with a hard thrust, a curling red spell hit the ceiling, forcing it to return to normal. Dumbledore had now spotted and was walking over to Moody. Teddy pricked his ears to listen but could hear what they were saying.
The Headmaster went to take his seat and as he did Moody took out his flask, gulping down its contents before shivering in disgust. Teddy cocked his head but straightened as the scarred man's enormous blue eye fell on him. He immediately refused to make eye contact and forced his attention on Mr Crouch.
"After much deliberation the Ministry has concluded that for their own safety no student under the age of seventeen shall be allowed to put forth their name for the Tri-wizard tournament. This decision is final."
The crowd is instantly unsettled, but Teddy let out a sigh of relief. At least he no longer had to worry about whether or not he should compete.
"No way!"
"That's not fair!"
"That's rubbish! That's rubbish!"
"Boo!"
"SILENCE!"
Teddy winced, covering his ears at Dumbledore's shouts. The hall went silent again. The long white haired wizard pulled out his wand and tapped it on the golden box. The golden washed away like water, revealing at large stone cup. Inside the cup burned a blue fire that lit up the Great Hall with an eerie glow.
"The Goblet of Fire." Dumbledore explained. "Anyone wishing to submit themselves for the tournament, merely write their name upon a piece of parchment and throw it in the flame before this hour on Thursday night. Do not do so lightly, if chosen there's no turning back. As from this moment the Tri-wizard tournament has begun."
The students were excused from the Hall and Teddy waited for the others at the door. "So, what do you think?" He asked them.
"I think it's completely unacceptable."
"It sounds awesome!"
Both Hermione and Ron said at the same time. Soon Teddy said goodnight to them and begun to walk to his room. It was just as he had left it. None of the school's house elves wanted to clean the room of the werewolf boy, not that Teddy minded. It gave a sense of reassurance that here was the one place he could be alone if he wanted to. Of course, he didn't always want to.
Teddy opened his suitcase, putting his clothes away in his wardrobe and resting his wand, Hogsmeade form and a small newspaper cutting of his dad on his bedside table. Teddy remembered how his dad's photo had been all over the Daily Prophet when the secret of his lycanthropy had been discovered. "Miss you, Dad."
Teddy sighed before pulling on his pyjamas and wondering how his friends were spending their first night back at Hogwarts.