The Second Task

Harry held his trusted Firebolt in his right hand. The four champions had been informed in the morning to bring their broom to the shore of the lake. Along the shore, some seating had been erected. Many more just sat on the rocky beaches and grass fields that lined the lake, on their own blankets and chairs. Many held omnioculars.

Unlike the first task, in which each champion had to master the task separately, this time the task would be a race and all four champions would compete at the same time. In the middle of the lake, the event organizers had taken their familiars and had hung them in cages on a floating, horizontal bar.

The challenge was that at the end of the hour, all four familiars would drop into the lake. Since they were in cages, they would drown, even if they could fly like Harry's owl Hedwig. This task was very reliant on them being good fliers. Harry wondered if they had designed this task after they learned that the champions would be three Quidditch players and a Veela.

But it would not be enough to simply fly across the lake, Harry could do that in five minutes. The border of the whole lake had been magically barred off, and now there were various beasts flying around. Occasionally they would mess with each other, but they were mostly calm for now. Harry just knew that as soon as the champions got in range, they would be the target of them all.

Harry saw several swarms of Amazonian Pixies fly about. But not only that, there were Griffins and Hippogriffs in the air. He also noticed some Thestrals. Had all of them seen death? Harry wondered how a champion who could not see them would be able to defend against them.

Bagman was clapped his hands, "All right, champions as you can see we are ready for the second task. You are to rescue your familiar from certain death. The original task was only hindered by the Pixies. But countless witches and wizards have written letters to the Ministry, and informed us that they were outraged at the trivial task." They had not been forced to participate, Harry thought. "They want to see epic feats of magic, so we added some more dangerous beasts. As you can see you will have to fend off Griffins, Hippogriffs and Thestrals as well."

Johnson raised her hand. "Sir, what are Thestrals?" That answered that question.

"Maybe your tutor will be able to help you, I can't be aiding you. I'm sorry." The grin on Bagman's face did not convince anyone of his sincerity. "Your tutors will take you to your separate starting platforms. You will start from there, and return there once you got your familiar."

Snape nodded at Harry and the two were ready to mount their brooms to do just that.

"But one more thing. To make it a bit more fun, Director Crouch and I have agreed to allow you to attack each other. Good luck."

Harry did not like the sound of that.

But without any more instructions forthcoming, the four champions and their tutors mounted their brooms and headed to their respective starts.

"Potter, I know you can fly, I want you to race for your owl, race back, and ignore all obstacles as much as you can, and don't start playing around with the other champions." Snape instructed as they flew.

"That was my thinking too."

"These theatrics don't really matter, if you are quickest you are bound to get a good score regardless."

Not much later, they arrived at a floating platform, hovering twenty yards in the air, a few paces from the shore. At the shore a crowd had gathered, waving green flags and chanting "Potter." While there were spectators spread around the whole lake, Harry could see from up here that at five locations there were bigger crowds. Four of them were by the champions starting platforms, and the fifth was by the judges stand.

Harry stepped onto the platform, but remained on his broom. Snape flew back to the judges stand.

"One more minute." The voice of Bagman carried across the lake.

Harry saw that the other three tutors had reached the judges stand.

"Get ready."

Harry breathed in and out slowly.

"Set."

He steeled himself and leaned into the broom.

"GO!"

Harry took of.

The lake was not in any way round, rather the shore formed countless bays and coves. its furthest distance across was roughly two miles. The four starting platforms were situated so that each champion had to traverse a mile to reach their familiar.

Harry's Firebolt could go from zero to one-fifty in ten seconds. If he could accelerate he would be at the center of the lake in lest then thirty seconds. But as soon as he left the platform, all beasts in range converged on him.

There was no chance of going top speed. Instead Harry had to slalom around the various beasts. He left the Pixies behind quickly. Even going a moderately slow was to fast for them. If only Moody's plan would have worked in the first task.

The bigger beasts were not so easily shaken off.

But even going slowly and constantly changing directions, a mile was not far for a broom. So only a few minutes later Harry was in the center.

Harry was not the first, Krum and Fleur, in her avian form, were already there. Johnson was not far behind.

Here it proved itself to be a bit harder than Snape had made it sound. Harry could not just pick up Hedwig's cage in flight. Harry's hand would be seriously injured if he smacked it into the wires of the cage at the speed he was going. It was also tied to the pole with some string, so he had to slow down to cut it regardless.

So he slowed down as he approached the beam. But this allowed a griffin to catch up to him. With its sharp fore claws, it tried to snatch at Harry's broom tail.

Its sharp claws were inches from the frail broom bristles.

The millimeter thick bristles of a Firebolt were engraved with countless runes. They were what allowed professional sport-brooms to outperform regular mass produced brooms. They were generally rather sturdy, and could be bent with only a little loss of control. This could easily be straightened out with a proper broom service kit. If one bristle was ripped, however, the broom would be worse then a wild Hippogriff.

Harry barrel rolled out of reach of the Griffin, avoiding this fate for now.

The other champions had similar problems at the moment. Only Fleur in her avian form was able to get to her familiar, a white hawk. She was pecking with her beak at the rope that held the cage.

Out of the corner of his eyes, Harry saw that Krum did not like this.

He threw a cutting curse at Fleur.

It hurled towards her, and she could not hear it coming, with the noise of her own pecking drowning out much of what occurred around her.

Lucky for her, a Hippogriff flew in the way of the curs. Its tough hide was magically resistant. The curse was nevertheless strong enough to make a long, deep cut. Krum was not kidding around. The Hippogriff screeched in a strange half horse, half eagle manner. Something between a screech and a neigh.

The Hippogriff charged Krum. Krum did not hesitate for a second for a second. He nonchalantly doubled down with a bone breaking curse. It hit the wing of the charging Hippogriff, which promptly crashed into the lake below.

And as far as the champions were concerned, the first spell had been cast.

Suddenly the air was filled with different glowing colors.

Harry tried to dodge as much as he could without getting drawn into the fireworks.

Time was ticking.

For the time being all he could do was circle around the center, avoiding both the various flying beasts and his violent competitors.

The three of them had begun to really go after each other. Fleur had become enraged by Krum, and had burst into flames. Krum was throwing very colorful hexes at her. She could not respond in kind. Instead she charged at him and hurled balls of fire when she was close enough. The fire leaped from the tip of her wings when she made particularly forceful downward strokes.

Johnson was also beginning to be involved in the exchange. She had slowed down to get at her familiar, a beautiful black cat, but had been caught by one of Fleur's fire balls.

She had retaliated.

Harry continued to circle the dueling trio. As he did so, he noticed that the spell fire had pushed the flying beasts away. Particularly Fleur's fire caused panic among them.

How could he use this to his advantage?

The altercation between his competitors kept the beasts away, the previous hurdle to get Hedwig back. But now Krum, Johnson and Fleur blocked the way by their spell fire. If he was hit by some of the worse spells, he would be out, and Hedwig would be lost.

The trio was constantly changing position, throwing curses and dodging or shielding from enemy curses.

Harry had to pay close attention to their activity, otherwise a stray curse would hit him.

Then he noticed the last spell that came from Krum: it was the unmistakable red of the cutting spell.

'That's it!' He thought. It would be risky, but he had practiced aiming for some time now. He could do it if he was still enough.

Harry slowed down and began hovering a good ten yards from Hedwig's cage. He chose his spot, so that when he had caught his owl, he could go straight for his own platform.

He would have to dive as soon as he cast, in order to catch her, before she disappeared into the lake.

Just then he noticed that Johnson had played a different risky game. She had been slowly getting closer to her cat as she was fighting, and now had reached her. Since she was not in avian form, she simply opened the door of the cage and grabbed the cat.

The poor cat meowed piteously, and wrapped her paws around the broom shaft. It clung to the broom for dear life.

Off was the Gryffindor champion.

This left Fleur and Krum to battle it out. Their fighting became even more frantic as they tried to duplicate Johnson's tactic. But they also really did not want to let the other reach their familiar, so they stalled each other.

Harry breathed slowly, 'Okay, game time. Can't let her get too much ahead.'

He steadied again, and did the downward swish of the cutting curse several times. Dry runs so to speak.

"Caedere!" He timed it perfectly. The curse flew and hit the rope. It struck, and Hedwig began to fall.

Harry didn't think, he let his seeker instincts take over and dove.

He pushed all he had into the broom.

The surface of the lake got at him, but so did Hedwig. Ten yards from the lake, Hedwig and Harry intercepted.

Harry's hand stung a little from the impact, when he grabbed the cage, but he was able to get a firm grip of it.

Harry pulled the broom up and veered away, and towards his platform. He was still going down too rapidly. His left knee scraped the surface. The robes were instantly drenched. His knee stung from the impact of hitting the water so hard. The wet robes dragged him down.

He was able to pull up and accelerate again. He was able to convert much of the downward momentum into forward movement anyway, and ignored his knee for the time. Madam Pomfrey's magic would take care of it later.

As soon as Harry was closer to the shore then to the middle of the lake, the beasts tried to attack him again.

They were not fast enough.

He did not slow down until he reached the platform. There he broke hard, came to a halt right above it. Harry stepped down onto it, and now really felt the knee injury. He could not put any weight on it.

Fortunately for him, he did not have to. As soon as he was on the platform, it began to drift down and to the shore.

As he reached the shore, he realized that the crowd was cheering, He could not really decipher what they were shouting, the adrenaline in his system was still pumping. He tried to step of the still floating platform, but did not manage to do anything more then stumble forward.

Before he hit the floor, Snape and Theo were at his side. Snape quickly levitated Harry, and Theo picked up his Firebolt.

Without a comment they went to the infirmary tent.

HPU

Madam Pomfrey fixed his knee in no time. She did complain that Harry again got injured.

Harry made no comment. He just lay on top of the bed and relaxed. Now that he was not in pain and still, he could feel how tired he was. Drowsiness washed over him. He might have dozed off.

Some time later, Harry did not know how much time had passed, Snape stood at the end of the bed. "Come, Potter, the judges are ready to give you points."

Harry stepped out of the tent, and saw that however much time had passed while his wounds were taken care of, it had been enough to gather many of the spectators around the judges tribune.

Unlike last time, where the four champions had stood together, at the center of the arena, this time they were spread out among the crowd. Harry followed Snape to a section of Hogwarts students, mostly Slytherins, but also some Ravenclaws.

When Snape stopped, Harry stopped as well. He turned to the podium. Theo appeared to his right. Harry was disappointed that Hermione was not here with him. And he felt almost guilty that Mafalda was not here. Surely she would cheer him on, if he had found her.

"Esteemed witches and wizards, what a day!" Director Bagman once again took charge of the judges. This time there was no Crouch to counter his exuberance. "We saw some of the finest flying outside of professional Quidditch, we saw an areal battle, and we saw the British champions beat the visitors. What a day!"

Both visiting headmasters rose in protests, but Bagman was not to be dissuaded. "Ms. Delacour once again took advantage of her vela abilities, and initially looked to build up her lead of the first task. After a malicious curse by Mr. Krum, a flying fight broke out between them and Ms Johnson. And what a fight it was. I think the dueling circles should take note, areal combat could be an exiting addition to ordinary dueling. It looks like Mr. Krum and Ms. Delacour are very evenly matched in this kind of competition, because they neutralized each other. Ms. Johnson took advantage of the situation, even before Mr. Potter. She was able to free her familiar during the fight and nothing could stop her after that. Mr. Potter followed her quickly and used a impressively aimed cutting curse, and a almost reckless dive for the same results.

"This left our visiting champions at a stalemate, they were not bring their duel to a conclusion, and were forced to agree to a ceasefire minutes before their familiars would have fallen to their death. Mr. Krum was then able to beat Ms Delacour to the finish line, as her avian form was slightly handicapped in finishing the task.

"I want to remind you again, to not only evaluate the finishing time, but also the manner with which each champion completed the task. As the four started simultaneously, this time we will evaluate them in the reverse order of completion. Ms. Delacour first."

As in the first task, the judgments of the different judges were quite varied.

Both Fleur and Krum received twenty-seven points. In Fleur's case, she received mostly mid-range scores, but Karkaroff decided that for her slow time she did not deserve anything better than a two. Krum got slightly lower scores, but Karkaroff gave him a six. This caused quite a stir with the French spectators. And really with most males in the audience…

Harry's performance was given mostly eights, give or take a point. Karkaroff was the outlier. From him Harry only received a five. This resulted in a score of thirty-seven. Better then Fleur's first place score in the first task! For Johnson's fastest rescue time, she earned a forty-two. Like Harry she received high scores from everyone but Karkaroff.

"There we have it!" Bagman boomed. "This gives us unexpected results. Adding the scores from the first two tasks we get the over all leader. The grand totals are fifty-eight for Mr. Krum, fifty-nine for Ms. Johnson, sixty-three for Ms. Delacour and sixty-eight for Mr. Potter."

The Slytherin contingent erupted in jubilation.

For the moment it was as after Quidditch matches. Potter was king. He was hoisted on some shoulders and carried to the Dungeons. An 'impromptu' party would have started here, just like after Quidditch victories, but Snape put a stop to that.

He insisted that everyone change into more formal wear.

He followed Harry to his room.

"I will let you celebrate for a while, after this, but I wanted to go over the task while it was fresh. Our next meeting is not until five days from now, so this is better."

"All right," Harry wanted to rest anyway. "I thought I did well, although I wish I had thought of my solution just a bit sooner. It was a little risky, but as far as I could see it was the best way to do it."

"It was definitely not as Gryffindor as Johnson's approach. What could you have done better?"

"Mmm… On the initial approach, I could have slowed down sooner. Maybe that would have allowed for a quick stop and go kind of approach. … No, I don't think so, the flying beasts were all over the place at the time."

"I think the it would have helped." Snape contradicted.

"But then it would have been me and Krum fighting, instead of him and Fleur."

"You might be right. I do think this shows how you are still not thinking fast enough. You were hovering around the fight for at least twenty minutes. A mind council would have been invaluable in that instance."

"I'm working on it, but you did say I needed to be cautious."

"I'll let you celebrate then."

That had been odd. Very little criticism from Snape. He was probably to happy that a Slytherin was taking the lead in the tournament, even if it was Potter.

Harry put on his finest robes, and joined the festivities. One of the prefects had organized an classical wizarding quintet, and House Slytherin waltzed around.