A/N: All creature facts I either made up to suit the needs of the story or came directly from Harry Potter wikia
At the sound of the cannon the champions dove into the frigid water. Fleur cast simultaneous warming charms and the bubble head charm. Once those were cast she transfigured her feet into flippers and kicked deeper into the water. Her Veela was not happy about being submerged into the water but wanted to complete the task, as most likely her sister was who she needed to save, she would not let her sister down.
She went deeper and looked around the murky water. Water plants covered in algae littered the depths. Fleur and Hermione had spent a long time researching possible magical creatures in the depth and knew a few that would be down here. Hermione helped her to memorize the facts about the ones they surmised would be most likely down here. She mentally catalogued the facts:
Grindylow
- Less than five feet tall
- Horns, often sharp and spiky
- Aggressive nature
- Sickly green skin color
- Eye color yellow and white
- Aggressive towards witches, wizards and muggles alike
- They survive on fish, algae, small sea creatures, but from time to time will eat humans
- Defense: long brittle fingers, key is to break their grip. Revulsion Jinx is recommended
Merpeople
- Eye, hair, and skin color varies
- Related to siren, selkie, and merrow
- Half fish and half human looking
- Species in the Black Lake are decidedly more fish than human in appearance
- Height varies
- Weapons: tridents and spears
- Defense-?
Veela are said to be descended from sirens, and so she hoped her creature status would help her in good will for this task with regards to the lesser known Merpeople. Shown respect went a far way in the creature world, and she would do anything she could to respect the sentient beings. The Grindylows worried her more, as the seemingly more aggressive creatures.
Her vision remained murky but she swam into what seemed like an underwater town. This gathering of buildings with holes cut out in the buildings for windows without glass panes, were large enough to swim in and out of. No doors were present just window holes. The area was eerily quiet, but at times she could swear out of the corner of her eyes she could see movement. Carefully she swam forward. The deeper into the city it got brighter, converging towards the center of the town where a large sculpture lit up the underwater area. A large depiction of The sea god Poseidon, trident in hand pointing angrily at robed small wicked looking wizards with looks of fear on their nefarious looking faces, being covered in wave upon wave drowning due to their menacing actions towards the righteous, benevolent water faring people.
The statues depicted the sea creatures obvious viewpoints on the witches and wizards, one that sent a chill down Fleur's spine.
Fleur made a plan to stay as far away from any enclosed or structure in general. The flashes of movement in her peripheral vision increased and she knew she was being followed. Passing high over the statue she thought she was clear, until she felt a set of long fingers grasping onto her ankle. Going through her quick checklist again she knew what she had encountered before looking. Silently thanking Hermione's vigilance she quickly cast the Revulsion Jinx and broke free from the Grindylow.
Picking up her pace Fleur swam through another curtain of algae. In the murky distance she could see three non moving figures, chained to the dark depths below. Upon closer inspection she could make out who they were. As predicted her sister was there, but also Draco, and Ron. The Weasley was the curious one of the bunch.
She was almost to her sister when she saw overhead a massive maniacal shark head barreling towards her at breakneck speeds. Eyes bulging out of her head she scrambled to move away. Slightly confused, as this was a creature that reportedly should not inhabit the Black Lake, or any lake for that matter.
The beast attacked her, ramming it's massive head into her chest, then nicking the side of her chin on its path back to try and hit her again.
Moving it's head to the side as it regrouped to further damage her, she saw the beginnings of…
wait…
it couldn't be…
that blasted Bulgarian!
Victor's Jersey!
The Veela was enraged, she stopped fleeing and turned on the spot. It was a happy coincidence that over the winter break in America it was Shark Week. Her father in his never ending boyish wonder had forced her to watch several hours of the footage while waiting for her mate to finish patrol. With that knowledge in her mind she reared back her fist and punched the shark head on the nose repeatedly. Stunned and with the transformed face, the shark head fell back, falling into the algae below. He fell on top of a few merpeople that were on guard, making sure the rules were followed in accordance to the games treaties.
A pained garbled cry from the Bulgarian made Fleur look down at the male entangled in the watery mass of green plants and creatures surrounding the struggling brute. Merpeople pointing their fierce looking tridents on the struggling boy.
Fleur took the moment he was distracted to swim towards her sister, only to see Harry breathing through what must be gills. He was gently cupping Draco's jawline with his hand, looking at the other boy's closed eyes before sending off a spell to break the chain holding the blonde Slytheryn male.
Knowing she had limited time left she went for her sister. Following Harry's lead she broke the chain with a strong spell, and carried her sister to the top of the lake.
Once the fresh air hit both Delacour sisters both the bubble head charm and the spell immobilizing her sister broke. The brisk air surrounded the pair and they swam towards one of the three wooden towers.
Hermione was the first face she saw, she had partially transformed and apparently had been held back by her friend in a lion head costume. Her clothes were partially ripped but not enough to reveal anything, just tattered and a crazed look and menacing growl was slowly receding as her mate met Fleur's eyes.
Both seemed to breathe a sigh of relief at the sight of each other. After helping Gabrielle out of the lake Fleur was tackled while still in the water by her wolf, who apparently had been released by her friend. They waded in the water while passionately kissing the daylights out of each other. Long moments and several cat calls later to the sounds of the wolf's loud purring Fleur nudged Hermione to help her out of the water.
Hermione with her increased body heat had no use of a towel, grabbed one instead for her imprint and covered her as well as wrapped her own arms over the towel, enveloping the shorter blonde in her natural body heat. She did not care that her shirt was in shambles and pants looked like they were from a shipwreck survivor's wardrobe. Her imprint was safe and in her arms, that was all that she cared about, it was what her wolf was focusing on, soothing her instincts through physical touch she slowed her breathing, while placing her forehead to Fleur's back of her head, closing her eyes breathing in her imprints sweet scent.
Harry had surprised every one when both himself and Draco emerged and immediately snogged, almost forgetting to swim. They laughed at their near drowning and went to the platform, holding hands once covered in towels with warming charms enchanting them.
Time had long sense been called, and the Bulgarian had not been seen. The crowd became restless, whispers came from the student body.
Ten minutes slowly passed until a familiar still unconscious redhead broke the surface, quickly followed by the jerk face…err sharkheaded face slowly transforming back to Victor.
No one knew why Ron had been chosen until Ron was hurriedly brought to the floor of one of the towers. He wasn't breathing and Victor furiously began CPR, eventually breaking the enchantment and rolling to his stomach clearing the watery blockage from her throat. Once cleared Victor forcefully slammed Ron back to the floor and snogged the redhead sloppily. You could hear a pin drop, with the audience's stunned expressions and dropped jaws. It appeared Ron's hero worship of the man's quittitch's skills was masking his deeper attraction to the brute. He would later thank his sister for pulling his head out of his arse about his former overt blatant homophobia, and the subsequent punishment that made him realize that he was actually bisexual, and very attracted to Victor. It would also appear that the interests were returned if the awkward sloppy kiss was anything to go by.
An audible clearing of the throat brought everyone back from their surprised stupor. Placing his wand at his throat Professor Dumbeldore announced the placings of the champions as follows:
For the second task only:
- First place went to Harry for completing the task the quickest
- Second place to Fleur
- Victor had not placed, as he did not finish the task in the required time, and lost 10 points for attacking another champion.
When the point deduction was explained, Fleur and Luna had to physically restrain the lunging wolf from wringing the neck of the now taunting smiling male. Fleur turning to Hermione whispered calming tones in her ear, on repeat 'I'm fine, I'm safe, I love you'
The reaction from Victor left no doubt in Ron's head what had exactly happened, and while he was pretty thick, he was loyal to his friends when the chips were down. This caused Ron to look incredulously at his new beau and yell, 'oh bugger this, I don't care how good of a shag you are, I will not put up with someone attacking my best mate's wife in a life threatening way. Bugger off!'. Ron said as he pushed Victor back in the frigid cold water as he stormed towards the bank and back up to the castle…
