Yeah I know I went pretty fast to the selection but it was only one day, Gabriel doesn't pay attention a whole lot in class and that's what we all want to read about anyway.

I feel like I should explain the whole goblet thing. Yes, Harry Potter's name came out, but if the goblet's smart enough to judge someone when all it has is their name, it's smart enough to figure out that Gabriel is the one inside Harry Potter and choose him instead. Plus, the contract applies to their magical core, which technically is Harry's and was just sort of transplanted over to Gabriel when he possessed Harry.

Disclaimer: I do not own Supernatural or Harry Potter.

The hall was completely silent as Gabriel slipped through the doors, discarding the invisibility cloak as he did so. The Goblet still cast its blue glow, but now there was another source of light as well. A gold circle was inscribed on the floor around it, occasionally flaring up as if mimicking the flames in the cup.

Gabriel stood for several moments, watching it silently. It was nearly midnight, and it had been only too easy to get out of Ravenclaw tower and down to the entrance hall.

The Goblet was very strange.

It might have been because it was made by wizards, but Gabriel had never encountered anything quite like it. It was powerful, yes, and the magic with which it was imbued with was nearly as bright as the fire which filled it. It might have been difficult to look at, if Gabriel were really human.

But then, if he were human, he wouldn't be able to see it at all.

Gabriel dropped his gaze to the gold line in the floor, obviously the age line. Snorting, he stepped over it to take a closer look at the goblet. Like that would do anything to stop him.

Taking a closer look, it became apparent to Gabriel that there were miniscule runes overlaying the goblet. They weren't carved - someone had to have written them on with a wand somehow.

"Interesting." The runes turned the cup into something resembling an artificial intelligence, though it was nowhere near sentient. Gabriel stood up and tilted his head back to regard the flames. It was impossible to identify exactly which spell was creating them, among the mess which were meshed together.

Gabriel smirked. "Quite a relic, but I've seen better." He dug in his pocket. "Now where did I put those?" He pulled out a small stack of names. "There we go. Let's see, who do I want to piss off the most?"

It was a very close match. Gabriel ended up dumping the entire pile in. Serve them right. Let's see what Lucifer and Michael thought of a binding magical contract. Assholes.

Gabriel spun on his heel and turned to leave, stooping to pick up the cloak on his way out and closing the door behind him.

Because of that, he didn't see the person enter on the other side of the hall.

Halloween was full of muttering and even more speculation about who will enter and who will be chosen for the various schools. In this way, Gabriel learned a lot more about the possible competitors than he'd ever cared to know. Fred and George had ended up with impressive beards trying to beat the age line with some aging potion - so did one of the Ravenclaw girls in Gabriel's year, apparently.

People were gossiping over who had put their name in, and house rivalries were stronger than ever as each House tried to insist that one of their own would win the title of champion. Honestly, it was all anyone ever talked about anymore. Even Hermione came over to discuss it with Michael. Gabriel was almost ready to go and hide somewhere under the invisibility cloak to avoid yet more questions being thrown back and forth about the tournament.

The usual Halloween decorations were in place - colored candles, huge carved pumpkins, live bats fluttering to and fro. They didn't draw much attention, but the Beauxbatons students all lining up to put their names in did.

Halloween night came quickly and at the same time too slowly. The Goblet had been moved so that it now stood in front of Dumbledore's empty chair, and people cast glances through it all through dinner. When the plates finally cleared themselves [to Gabriel's disappointment - it was Halloween after all] Dumbledore rose to speak.

"The Goblet is ready to make its decision," he announced. "I estimate that it requires one more minute. When the champion's names are called, I would ask that they come up here and along the table, and exit through this door." He gestured towards a door to the right of where he was sitting, which most likely led into another room. "There, they will receive their instructions for the first task."

Dumbledore raised his wand and made a sweeping movement with it. At once, all the candles save those in the pumpkins were extinguished, creating a dramatic lighting effect. The goblet was the brightest thing in the room, and nearly everyone's eyes were trained on it.

The flames in the goblet abruptly turned red and flared up, becoming much taller with a sound like a high wind. A tongue of flame shot into the air along with a scrap of parchment, which Dumbledore reached out and caught. He held it at arm's length, to read it by the light of the fire, which had gone back to blue.

"The champion for Durmstrang is Viktor Krum!"

The red-robed students broke into especially loud cheers as applause swept the hall. The person who was presumably Viktor stood up and made his way up to the teacher's table, Karkaroff grinning widely at him as he passed and the door closing with a thud behind him.

The flames turned red once more and another piece of parchment shot out, which was again caught.

"The champion for Beauxbatons is Fleur Delacour!"

More cheering, though many of the other Beauxbatons students looked rather upset. One of them actually dissolved into tears, while Fleur [who was the same girl who had captivated so many of the boys] followed Krum's path up to the door.

Red flames, flaring up, parchment, catch for the third time.

"The Hogwarts champion is Cedric Diggory!"

Gabriel had no idea who that was.

The Hufflepuff table exploded into cheers, jumping to their feet and yelling. The boy who must have been Cedric was grinning broadly as he made his way forward, and the applause lasted so long that it took Dumbledore several minutes to make himself heard again.

"Well!" He said, smiling. "Now we have our three champions! I am sure I can count on every one of you to give them your full support. By cheering your champion on, you will contribute a very real-"

He stopped in the middle of his sentence.

The reason was obvious.

The Goblet had flared red again, sparks pouring from the cup and a fourth piece of parchment shooting into the air. Dumbledore caught it and stared at it for a moment and Gabriel didn't need him to say the name aloud to know whose it was.

The sudden grip of something seizing very tightly around his magical core told him exactly what that parchment said.

"Harry Potter!"

Fucking Halloween bad luck.

The door creaked as Gabriel pushed it open. It led into a smaller antechamber which was full of shelves piled with all sorts of things, but Gabriel didn't pay attention to it. He was busy composing a Trickster-worthy payback for whatever jackass had decided to put his vessel's name in the Goblet and really, they'd put up a defense to stop people from aging themselves put nothing to stop a person from putting someone else's name in?

Well, that had worked in his favor last night, but regardless. It was stupid.

The other three champions [and why of all things did Gabriel have to be dragged into this?] were standing around a small fireplace, where several chairs had been left. They turned to face Gabriel as he got closer.

"What is it?" Cedric asked. "Do they want us to come back into the hall?"

They thought he was here to deliver a message. How ironic, considering Gabriel's past occupation. Gabriel's retort was lost as the door banged open behind them.

"Extraordinary!" said the man who had been wearing yellow robes, walking speedily towards them. Gabriel had no idea who he was. "Really quite amazing! Ladies and gentlemen, may I introduce...the fourth triwizard champion!"

"The what?" Krum said incredulously, but just then Dumbledore caught up.

"Harry," he said severely, "Did you put your name in the goblet of fire?"

"Of course not," Gabriel scoffed.

"Did you get an older student to put it in for you?"

"No."

"But of course, he is lying!" Maxine scowled, batting a lamp out of her way and causing it to swing crazily. Gabriel gave her a dirty look which was lost in the sudden arrival of Karkaroff and the other man.

Cedric and Fleur were looking at Gabriel incredulously. "There must have been a mistake," Fleur said, her own accent flavoring the words. "He cannot compete! He is too young."

Excuse me? Gabriel was older than her entire family line. And then some. If anything, he was too old.

"What is the meaning of this?" Karkaroff demanded. "I wasn't aware of a rule saying that the host school was allowed two champions, Dumbledore. We were under the impression that your age line would keep out any underage competitors."

"He could not have crossed the age line," McGonagall protested, having come in as well.

"Then you must have made a mistake with the line!" Maxine insisted.

"It is entirely possible, of course." Dumbledore allowed.

"Dumbledore, you know perfectly well that you didn't make a mistake!" McGonagall said angrily. "What nonsense! Harry could not have crossed it, and as Dumbledore believes that he did not get someone else to put his name in that should be good enough for all of you!"

She cast a severe gaze around. Gabriel tried not to laugh. Of course he could cross the age line, but it wasn't like any of them knew that.

"Mr. Crouch...Mr. Bagman," Karkaroff said after several moments of silence. "You are our - er - objective judges. What do you say?"

The mustached man - Crouch, maybe - was standing half in shadow so that he looked like some sort of villain. The mustache didn't help.

"We must follow the rules," he said, "And the rules state that whoever's name comes out of the goblet of fire, they are bound to compete in the tournament."

"Well, Barty knows the rulebook back to front," said the man who was most likely Bagman [and what was he so happy about?].

"I insist upon resubmitting the rest of my students," said Karkaroff. He looked furious, and had dropped his smile. Gabriel stopped paying attention to the man with a roll of his eyes - did he do anything but complain? Honestly. Gabriel refocused on the other three champions, all of whom had been relatively quiet.

They all looked to be in various stages of either disbelief, outrage, or just not caring. Fleur had turned her back to the conversation and had taken a seat in one of the armchairs.

The conversation didn't seem to be stopping anytime soon. Moody had entered at one point, and Karkaroff seemed a bit terrified of him. Strange. Gabriel leaned against the shelf next to him and wondered if he'd ever be allowed to leave the room, or if they were going to keep arguing about the tournament.

"Maybe someone's hoping Potter is going to die for it." Moody growled.

That brought Gabriel's attention back. If this was some sort of assassination plot, then it was very poorly thought out. He almost snorted at the idea of one of the tasks killing him. Please.

They took forever to figure it out, but eventually they all decided that Gabriel had to compete - which he already knew. But no. It wasn't like there was a binding magical contract that had already established itself.

Gabriel tugged on the thing around his magical core. It was very solidly in place. Damnit.

"Mr. Crouch?"

The man with the mustache - Crouch - stepped forward. He looked mildly ill. "Yes...the first task..."

"The first task is designed to test your daring, so we are not going to be telling you what it is," he said to Gabriel and the other three. "Courage in the face of the unknown is a very important quality in a wizard...very important...

"The champions are not permitted to ask for or accept help from teachers to complete the tasks in the tournament. The champions will face the first task armed only with their wands. You will receive information about the second task at the end of the first. Owing to the demanding nature of the tasks, you will all be exempt from end-of-year exams."

Hello, silver lining.

The champions left fairly quickly, Maxine leading Fleur away as they spoke rapidly in French.

Dumbledore looked at Cedric and Gabriel. "Well! I suppose you two had better go up to bed. I am sure Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff are waiting to celebrate with you."

Gabriel went off immediately. Cedric followed behind him, and as they both came out into the now-empty hall Gabriel felt a hand on his shoulder.

"How did you do it?" Cedric asked. "You know...get your name in."

"I didn't put mine in." Gabriel gave Cedric a dry look. "Why would I want to?"

"Why wouldn't you?" Cedric looked astonished. "The prize, of course."

"You mean glory, money, and the cup?" Gabriel raised his hands to tick them off on his fingers. "Fame - got that already, don't need more. Money? Got that too. Fancy trophy? Useless." He dropped his hands again. "So no, I didn't enter myself. Have fun doing whatever the hell Hufflepuffs do."

Gabriel turned on his heel and left.

The other Ravenclaws were only too ready to celebrate when he got back to the tower that night, but Gabriel just went straight through the mess and up to his dorm, sticking the curtains around his bed shut.

When he woke up the following morning, it took Gabriel a minute to remember why he felt vaguely annoyed. Michael was waiting for him in the now empty common room.

"If you ask me if I entered myself I'm going to throw something."

"I wasn't," Michael said hurriedly. "I mean, I saw how disinterested you were in it. And I'm not stupid."

Gabriel raised an eyebrow skeptically. "So what are you waiting down here for?"

"You." Michael shrugged. "I figured you might want to avoid the hall for now, because of last night. And Hermione wanted to talk to you, by the way."

"Alright." Gabriel opened the door of the common room, Michael standing to follow. "Let's go out by the lake, we can talk there."

Hermione was waiting in the entrance hall, and didn't complain when they went outside despite the misty morning. "You don't mind skipping breakfast?" she asked as the walked along the shoreline.

"I only eat so people don't think I'm starving myself," Gabriel answered idly, hopping on top of a large rock. "I don't actually need to."

"Really?" Hermione pulled herself up after him. "Does it taste any different?"

"Sort of." Gabriel sat down on the top and looked out over the lake. Hermione reached down to offer Michael a hand up.

"What does it taste like?"

"Molecules."

Michael looked baffled. "What are-"

"It's a Muggle thing," Hermione told nir. "It's a bit complicated. Basically it's what the food's made up of."

"Oh." Michael sat down with a sigh. "You know, I bet you could have gotten over the Age Line."

"I did."

They both looked over at him at that. "I thought you said you didn't put your name in?" Michael asked in confusion.

"I didn't put mine in. Or Harry's."

Hermione rolled her eyes. "I'm not even going to ask."

"That's probably a good idea."

They sat in companionable silence for a bit, looking out over the lake as the mist was slowly burned away by the sun.

"How old are you?" Hermione asked suddenly.

Gabriel and Michael both looked at her. Hermione blushed lightly.

"I mean - I suppose you don't have to answer," she muttered. "I was just sort of...wondering."

Gabriel sighed and leaned back. "Neither of you really know much about Christianity, do you? Or any other religions?"

They both shook their heads. Michael propped nemself up a little higher, turning slightly to look at Gabriel.

"Well..." Gabriel considered how to phrase it. "I'm very old. I'm older than the school. Or the lake. Or the mountains. Or the Earth. Or even this universe. I've been around a very long time." Hermione looked fascinated. "There are only a couple of beings older than me - my older brothers, God, and Death."

"Death?" Hermione asked.

"Yeah. The Horseman, you know. Rides a pale horse."

"So like in the Tale of the Three Brothers?" Michael asked. "Death is a person?"

"I wouldn't call him a person by a long shot." Gabriel replied dryly.

"What's the tale of the Three Brothers?" Hermione asked.

"Right, you wouldn't have heard them." Michael summarized the story for her, giving the bare details.

"Did that actually happen?" Hermione glanced up at Gabriel.

Gabriel shrugged. "Don't look at me. What, do you think I have teatime chats with Death?"

Michael snorted at that. "That's an odd picture."

"Aren't there supposed to be four Horsemen?" Hermione listed them off. "Death, War, Famine, Plague..."

"Pestilence," Gabriel corrected. "And yeah, there are four. Death's just the oldest."

"So..." Michael was frowning. "If God was supposed to have created everything, did He create the Horsemen?"

"Maybe." Gabriel shrugged. "I don't think even Death and Him know who's older anymore. It's been a while."

"What about evolution?" Hermione was endlessly full of questions.

"True or not? It's true," Gabriel said, smirking. "Dad just gave it a little push."

"Huh." Hermione considered it. "You know, I looked up what information there was on Gabriel - er, I mean you-"

"Oh, not the internet." Gabriel let himself lie down fully, flopping onto the stone. "So much false information."

"It's just a few things." Hermione sounded a little insulted. "But I was remembering what you told us about Christmas - about how G- er, you had to go tell Mary she was pregnant."

"Don't remind me." Gabriel groaned.

"Was it boring or something?" Gabriel propped himself up again at Michael's slightly incredulous question.

"She thought I was a demon and tried to knock me out with an amphora," he said dryly. "So not the best of times, no."

"She what?"

Gabriel was pulled out of lessons early a few days later. The girl who had been sent to get him - Luna - was just below his year in Ravenclaw, and was very...odd.

"It's called the weighing of the wands," she told him as they walked. "I'm sure they'll want to take photographs or something."

"Great," Gabriel sighed. "Just what I felt like doing today."

"I'm sure it will be fine," Luna said dreamily as they came to a stop in front of a closed door.

"Right." Gabriel turned away and made to go inside.

"Oh, and Harry?"

"Yeah?"

"You should probably take better care of your wings."

Gabriel froze. Then, he slowly turned around. Luna was smiling gently. "They're not in very good condition," she told him seriously. "I doubt you can fly like that." She turned and continued down the hallway, humming quietly.

Gabriel stared after her.

He certainly hadn't expected to run into someone like that here.

There were only so many people that could comprehend his true form.

Puzzling over the odds that someone like that would be a wizard - or witch, rather, they seemed to be based on gender here - he opened the door and stepped inside.

The were a lot of people waiting inside, including the other three champions and, for some reason, Ollivander from the wand shop.

"Ah, excellent!" Bagman said. "Now that all four of you are here, we can continue!"

There was a woman with very obviously fake curls standing in front of a man with a large camera, her eyes fixed on Gabriel. Bagman gestured to her. "This is Rita Skeeter - she'll be doing a small piece for the Daily Prophet."

"Maybe not that small," Skeeter muttered. She was still watching Gabriel. "I wonder, would anyone mind if I had a quick interview with our youngest champion?"

"Not at all." Bagman said.

"I mind," said Gabriel at the same time, not moving when Skeeter tried to drag him away. Reporters. Great. He wrenched his arm out of her grip and glanced at Ollivander. "What am I here for?"

"The weighing of the wands," said Dumbledore cheerily as he swept into the room. "Forgive me for being late, I am afraid something came up suddenly." He nodded to Ollivander. "Mr. Ollivander is here to make sure that there are no problems with your wands, and that they are working properly for the first task."

Ollivander stepped forward into the center of the room. "Mademoiselle Delacour, if you would like to go first?"

By the time they got to Gabriel, he was wondering how long this thing was going to take and handed over his wand almost absentmindedly.

"Ah, yes," said Ollivander, running his fingers over the Enochian. "I remember this one. Twelve inches, pine wood, and a rather unusual feather..."

Ollivander spent longer examining Gabriel's wand, but eventually created a cup of wine and pronounced himself satisfied.

"Thank you all," said Dumbledore. "You may go back to your lessons now - or perhaps it would be quicker to go straight down to dinner-"

Gabriel was out the door before anyone could say anything else.

There was a letter waiting on Gabriel's bed when he got back to the tower. An owl had obviously dropped it off, since there were several scattered feathers. Gabriel brushed them off as he picked up the letter. Who would be writing to him?

Harry-

I heard about the tournament. I'm coming up to Hogwarts immediately. Remus is coming too. I know you'll say you can look after yourself, and Dumbledore and Moody are both there, but someone's getting a good try at hurting you. Entering you in that tournament would have been very risky, right under Dumbledore's nose.

Be on watch. I want to hear about anything unusual. I'll arrive by the 22 of November.

-Sirius

Huh.

Gabriel hadn't had time to consider Sirius. Of course, he'd been named Harry's godfather - however he'd found out about the tournament, he'd be understandably worried, since he wasn't aware that Gabriel wasn't really Harry Potter.

And if Lupin was coming too...he might have convinced Sirius not to ask about what had happened at the end of last year. Or, they might both have questions that would be difficult to answer.

Maybe he could get Michael and Hermione to explain it for him, if it came to that.

The days left until the first task seemed to speed by until it was already two days away. There was a Hogsmeade visit that day, but Gabriel declined to go - Hermione had asked if he wanted to meet up in the Three Broomsticks but he knew it was just her trying to get him to talk to Ron again.

Which, incidentally, Gabriel was not actually at fault for. The redhead hadn't spoken or even made an effort to do so ever since Halloween, and Gabriel didn't particularly care to try and mend things. It was Ron's decision, and besides they didn't see each other a whole lot anyway.

There seemed to be a new fad of people wearing buttons which read Support Cedric Diggory - the REAL hogwarts champion. Gabriel never ceased to be amazed [and maybe a little annoyed] at the stubbornness of humans. Like he was stealing any glory.

Hermione seemed thoughtful when she came back to the castle, and immediately sought out Gabriel.

"Hagrid wanted me to give you a message," she told him in the great hall at dinner. "Where were you, by the way? I couldn't find you anywhere."

"I was in Muriel's room. What does he want?"

"Mur - oh, right. He said for you to meet him at his hut at midnight, that he had something to show you."

"Show me?" What the hell did Hagrid have to show him?

Gabriel showed up purely out of curiosity.

He didn't wait for Hagrid, of course. He'd brought the cloak, and when something roared in the forest he swung it around himself and went straight in, wondering what sort of creature could make that sort of noise.

The answer turned out to be dragons.

"Fucking hell."

Gabriel was peering over at the huge cages - four of them - from behind a small hill, because dragonfire was still strong enough to rip through any shield he could conjure and he didn't want to have to explain to anyone who might come over why his burns had miraculously healed.

There were people running around trying to keep the dragons under control with some sort of red spell. The one farthest from Gabriel, a spiky black one, was thrashing around in its cage and Gabriel finally had time to wonder why the looked so traditionally dragonish.

There were four different piles of eggs near where Gabriel was hiding and holy mother of shit. These were nesting mothers. Holy fuck Gabriel was going to need a really good plan to not sustain some sort of injury.

And whoever was in charge thought this was a good idea, why?!

Gabriel dropped into a seat next to Michael the next morning. "I need to ask you some stuff."

"Okay?" Michael glanced over curiously. "Now?"

"Yes. About dragons."

"...What do you need to know about dragons for?"

"It's for the first task."

He could see the moment Michael realized what that meant. "Oh my - you're joking."

"Unfortunately, no."

"What do you need to know?"

"I don't actually have a whole lot of experience with dragons."

"And you think I do?"

"I think you've probably at least heard of what they're like."

Michael hesitated. "I suppose..."

"That'll have to do. Are these dragons the traditional gold-and-virgin-stealing type?"

"What?"

"I'll take that as a no. Can they talk?"

"Of course not!" Michael looked at Gabriel incredulously.

"Turn into humans?"

"No!"

"I must be used to a different kind of dragon."

Couldn't resist making a joke about the dragons from Supernatural.

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