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It's been a tough week for Harry. Not only did the whole school pay attention to him, but they only confirmed his belief that it was better not to focus the eyes of others on himself. Especially since Hogwarts never taught cooperation, never caused bonds to tighten. Children at the school were divided into houses, and the scoring system, where everyone was punished for their house mates, didn't help either. Because of this, small, closed groups of friends were formed to support each other, but unless you were a social, feisty person, like the principal Hogwart representative Cedric, you ended up alone. This was also the case with Harry.

After the events in his dormitory, Harry, like the rest of the triwizard champions, was given their own quarters. Where, besides just a bedroom, a bathroom, he was given a living room and a kitchen. This, however, did not calm the whispers about him in the corridors, or the lessons.

—-

A few days later.

Harry blinked rapidly. He did not know by what miracle, but he was persuaded to do a show for his school club. The Great Hall was always ready for club shows after lunch, and today was their day. He stepped onto the elevated platform and looked around at the assembled people.

He wasn't expecting a crowd, but the number of people present was surprising.

"I'm going to kill you, Colin," Harry whispered to himself.

It was his colleague who had persuaded him to perform tonight. One argument was the small number of people interested in the mind's art. However, he underestimated Colin. That smile of his colleague, a year younger, who had just climbed the platform, said it all. -Harry had been set up

Yes, there may have been few people interested in developing the now extinct art of the mind, but quite a few people wanted to see Harry and either judge him, see what he could do, or just hope for his spectacular failure in front of students from three schools

Harry panicked. He no longer had an escape route. He stepped onto the platform, which was now like a cage in a zoo for a wild animal. Just five minutes ago, he could have called everything off, but lost in his own thoughts, he failed to see the impending danger.

This was not how it was supposed to be. He had to calm down. Most of these people won't even speak to him. Why bother with them? He shouldn't be so upset. All he had to do was not be a colossal fuck-up, and Colin would be happy.

"Alright, next: please give a loud round of applause for the Magnificent Harry Potter, Hogwarts Triwizard Champion!" - announced throwing sonorus Colin earlier. Harry squirmed. He definitely didn't agree with any nicknames, especially that were associated with cheap Muggle illusionists.

"H-Hello everyone!" Harry greeted awkwardly, only to hear a single round of applause.

"Um. Today I'm going to do a little hypnosis show for you guys."

He looked around at the assembled people. In fact, most faces betrayed a lack of understanding of the concept. "Hypnosis is a kind of muggle art, something bordering on magic that muggles can perform," a wave of giggles ran through the room. After all, everyone knew muggles were totally non-magical. This was an assumption Harry had been arguing with for some time, and his research steered him toward hypnosis.

"Without a wand, without the aid of any other magic, I will cause the volunteer, will involuntarily do my every command, will feel what I command and um. He will act according to my commands until the end, until I release him" When he paused, there was another round of applause, which gave him time to think. He smiled weakly. If he got his subject to the limits of the trance, he would be very lucky.

Despite the practice Harry had been doing for over a year, he got Colin to do a few simple things that only tested the depth of the whole trance. Even that, however, was after hours of fruitless trial and error. Today, he was to succeed in less than twenty minutes. It was a good thing that a backup plan had been developed.

"First, I need a volunteer, a volunteer," Harry looked around Great Hall, looking for club members previously substituted and instructed by Colin. He was about to choose someone from his junior year. The difference in age, willpower, and that they had seen how hypnosis really worked made them more susceptible to influence, and the entire show would go more smoothly. They also knew how to pretend so as not to cause the entire Great Hall to smile.

Then something made him turn his head to the side. He noticed more to the right of the room light blond hair, almost silver, which this time did not have the glow of fire. The girl looked at him with her hand raised, and her playful blue eyes met his gaze. His pulse quickened, without thinking, he threw out her name.

"Fleur."

Harry knew he had fallen into the trap she had set. Fleur wasn't at the mental arts club, and she hadn't come here because she was interested in the complete show. When she stood up, she winked ironically at the girl next to whom she was sitting. Yes, Harry understood exactly what had happened. The girl took advantage of how much attention was receiving. This allowed her to reach out directly to Harry, to learning about his capabilities, and also set his school more strongly against him. It was noticeable that hospitable schools, strongly held with each other, but Hogwarts was strongly divided.

Now it was too late. She had just walked onto the platform, attracting the eyes of the entire male audience. He was screwed. Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted Ron's face somewhere in the audience's eye, red with jealousy. If only he knew that this proximity to Fleur did not resemble the pleasant presence of a beautifully scented flower, but a venomous snake that she forced her eyes to select her candidacy, just like a mouse, to come out of its burrow.

"Um, I um, I never expected you to be interested in the mind's art," Harry said as she approached enough to hear his voice.

"Oh, I don't know," her mischievous smile, which appeared as she answered, made Harry shiver. He had encountered a predator that wanted to eat him on this stage. "The Triwizard Tournament was just created to explore the unknown, to get to know each other, to explore what we wouldn't normally know. After all, I'm also curious about what a fellow champion does. Right?" The audience gathered in the room giggled.

Merlin, she was so pretty. She was dressed only in a T-shirt and sweatpants with the emblem of her school, but she didn't need a beautiful outfit to stress her appearance. Even now it was easy to see that she was athletic, but also with perfectly shaped curves in all the right places. Harry had to admit that she could mesmerize even him with her looks alone.

"Very well," He accepted her answer, though he shrugged a little at the charm of her appearance. "Well, sit in the chair" Harry pointed to the throne one teacher had left behind. He froze as he noticed the French champion walk over to the piece of furniture and, with a confident smile, sit down like a ruler in her throne room. She puts her foot down and no one can say that this situation doesn't suit her, which can't be said of Harry. The stress is affecting him harder and harder. He already knows that he has lost.

At his level, he would have at least any chance of successful hypnosis, only if the person he was hypnotizing will do so. After a moment of silence, however, he pulled himself together. He couldn't give up now. He couldn't leave it all and run away, so he was left with taking a step forward and making a show of losing for everyone gathered.

"Ideal," He began a little uncertainly. "Well, um, can you give me your hand? I need a little hand" awkwardly he continued. Fleur hesitated at first, and although she was still smiling proudly, you could see the disgust in her eyes at touching someone like Harry. After a moment, she complied with Harry's words.

"Thank you, okay," he put his hand around hers, even more stressed. Her skin was incredibly warm, as if liquid fire flowed in her blood, and also incredibly smooth.

Only the full control of his powerful will allowed Harry to continue the show. "N-Now, I will try to put you into a trance, the very beginning, I will describe what I am doing, but in time, so as not to pull you out of the trance boundaries, I will stop doing it." He suspected that even his translations wouldn't help at all. The girl's powerful will, her aversion to him, much less to any attempt at hypnosis, were definitely insurmountable obstacles at Harry's current level.

"I'm going to do, um, an immediate induction. We call it a shock?" He asked, as if asking for permission. As if it wasn't him running the show, but actually his hypnosis subject.

He had to put her into a trance. According to the theory, it was simple, using stimuli, he should flood the subject with stimuli, which should lead to incapacitation. In short, if Harry were to use Moggle terminology, he was to overload Fleur's mind and then suspend it like a computer. The theory was simple, practise was worse. It was much more complicated. It was a process comprising several steps that should be performed smoothly in the right order, and if any of them were done wrong, the whole attempt would fail. To make matters worse, approaching a second attempt right after a failed first attempt further reduced the chance of success.

Just then, there was a problem with his voice. Harry hated the sound of his voice. Usually everything was fine, unless stress squeezed his throat too hard. Then his words would become cracked, strained, even squawking.

The voice for the hypnotist was a tool without which he could not achieve his goal, which is why it was so cherished by all the masters of the subject. They took care to give it a deep, soothing intonation, to make their diction smooth and free, like water. They had to reach a point where, listening to their voice, hypnosis subjects felt confidence in them, relaxation, so that any tension would be eased. Unfortunately, in Harry's case, this was unattainable. He couldn't even answer the teacher in a calm tone in class; everyone was already accustomed to squawking as he answered.

"I-would like you to calm down now, start focusing only on the sensations in your right arm," he said. He stammered. By now, he could give up. He knew perfectly well that he was broken, and he could not hypnotize her, especially being so nervous. He didn't want to let go of her hand, her skin, which with its warmth warmed his hand, which was cold with stress. "Now, um, okay, now move your eyes to... to..." he was lost in the next step. What was happening to him he had performed this step hundreds of times. Stress, because of stress and Fleur's proximity, he forgot everything. He looked in her direction.

Her smile grew wider.

She tilted her head to the side, looking at him with interest, like a bird of prey watching a mouse held by its tail, trying with its last strength to escape capture. "Are you okay?" Her voice was curious, full of worry, though Harry could perfectly feel the venom hidden in those words and the satisfaction of watching a defeated opponent.

Fuck, it was getting worse. Harry could perfectly feel a huge gulp growing in his throat, pressing so hard that he had to calm down before he could respond to anything, otherwise his voice would turn into a screech, so much like that wrapped mouse.

He closed his eyes. Focusing, he had to concentrate, dismiss all that surrounded him, as he had done more than once. After all, only about two weeks earlier, he had avoided the curses of death. Could focus solely on his goal during battle, but now? He was slowly cutting himself off. The world around him was fading away.

"Uh, did you say something about my eyes? Something wrong with them?" All the mental walls that had been separating him from stress suddenly collapsed when he heard Fleur's question. It was lost. He had lost. However, he would not back down. He mastered himself enough to keep his voice from squeaking. "Please look here," he asked as he raised his free hand. "Look at my hand all the time," He said a little more confident and began the next stage for which hypnotists are best known - the pendulum. The most common vision is a watch, or other small object, but this is not essential. It is important to keep the gaze and focus on the rhythmically moving point.

"Look only at the hand as it moves right in front of your eyes. Um, concentrate on the hand" He made sure that her gaze did not run to the side. All indications were that the girl had at least relaxed a little.

Hoping this was the moment he pulled her arm forward. "S-Sleep!" He issued the command, although in his head he even asked her several times to obey the command, but all hopes were immediately blown away like a wobbly candle flame.

"Hey, what the hell are you doing?" Fleur reacted surprised, a wave of laughter spread across the room, but a panicked Harry did not let go.

"I'm sorry, um, I mean, try to focus better on my hand and, and, and S-sleep!" He once again ordered in a voice breaking from panic as he pulled the girl by the arm. This time she was ready for it, barely moving, but not letting Harry out of her sight.

Her gaze betrayed everything. The smile evaporated. Only rage and a cruel glare appeared. If something Harry didn't do right away, she would stand up and mock him. Besides, the crowd watching this spectacle did not need her encouragement. They were already laughing at him. Harry straightened up.

He looked at Colin, who was discussing with the president of their club. He probably already wanted to stop the show, but was stopped. From this side, Harry received no help. His gaze turned to the hall. It was filled with a laughing audience. Faces whose features did not reach Harry.

And then he saw her.

I also invite you to my p atreon.

New content every day.

There is a chapter available on my p atreon: 2,3,4,5,6,7

pa treon .com(slash)pandorastories (remove the space)