Harry and the Pirates Chapter 55

The Yule Eve Tournament

by Technomad

The winter holidays were coming on apace, and the Duelling Association was preparing for a tournament. The Gladiators were acting confident, and Hermione smiled smugly in the Slytherin common room when she was asked if they had any special plans.

"Oh, we might…but I think I want to keep that sort of thing a surprise. Make sure you lot are on your toes, on the night." Several of her team mates who were in the room nodded in agreement. "And I want to see the expressions on your faces when you see what we've got cooked up!"

The smug behavior they were seeing from the Gladiators had the Furies worried. "Does anybody have any idea what they could have cooked up for us?" asked Dudley, one evening at a team meeting where privacy was assured.

"Good question, that," Ron Weasley said. "Does anybody have any information that could help?"

"We could find out what books they've been looking at in the library," Luna said, from her usual perch under Dudley's arm. She gave them all a beaming smile. "I could ask Madam Pince. We're on fairly good terms since Daddy and I donated a bunch of Mummy's old books to the Restricted Section."

Harry and Dudley exchanged glances. "Luna, sweetie, did you happen to write down any of the information in those books before you gave them away?" Dudley asked gently. He and Harry exchanged significant glances. They could not imagine just giving away books that had important information in them, at least without making sure that the information was safely tucked away in their possession.

"Of course I did, you big sillies!" Luna snuggled closer to Dudley. "It was just that we only have so much room at the Rookery, and we're always buying more books. Daddy and I make sure to copy the important parts of all of them before letting them out of our possession. And the really dangerous ones, we keep to ourselves."

"Sensible," somebody muttered. Harry made a mental note that he wanted to visit Luna's home. He wondered why it was called "the Rookery." Maybe there are a lot of crows and ravens about? he thought.

Meanwhile, life went on. The Slytherins were almost all pleased with their new pet. Cats, owls and the occasional novelty, like Neville Longbottom's toad, were familiar, but for some reason, Baskerville was the first dog that had been at Hogwarts for quite a while.

When Ginny had found him, he had been rather thin, and showed signs of having lived rough for some while. With so many people slipping him snacks, and the girls having a wonderful time combing and grooming him, he was rapidly growing sleek and elegant. Snape had looked at him askance at first, but between Dumbledore granting permission for him to stay, and Baskerville's own very good behavior, he was now resigned to the dog's presence. "He's a Slytherin dog," Ginny Weasley said. "Look! His coat matches Snape's robes perfectly!"

The only dissenter was Ron Weasley. Ever since Baskerville's advent, his rat, Scabbers, had been acting oddly, and nothing Ron or Hagrid could do seemed to help. "Maybe he's just getting old, Ron," Harry said one evening, when they were sitting around the dorm and discussing the situation. "How long have you had him?"

"He was Percy's rat before he was mine," Ron answered, absorbed in working on a Charms essay that was due later that week. In Slytherin, the rule was to get at homework as soon as assigned, instead of waiting for the last possible minute. This was enforced by the upper-level students, who also made themselves available to anybody who needed help. They wouldn't do the work themselves, but they would often go over it and point out places where it was erroneous or could be improved. This was one of the reasons why the Slytherins' grades were so high.

"And when did Percy get him?" Harry had something niggling at him, but couldn't bring it forward. He was wrestling with a Transfiguration essay, and the concepts involved were difficult for his Muggle-raised mind sometimes. He wrote down an equation, scowled at the tangle he got for an answer, erased it, and started again.

"I was real little then. Perce wanted a pet, but what with things being tight, we couldn't afford one. He found this rat who acted tame and friendly, and we decided that he could keep him. He was Percy's pet before he came to me; once Percy became a prefect, Mum got him an owl."

"So how old is he?" The niggling feeling didn't go away. Harry finally finished his equation, wiped sweat from his brow, and went on to the next one.

"Beats me," Ron mumbled, scribbling away at his essay. "I don't know how old he was when Perce got him, though. Might just be that he's coming to the end of the trail." He looked sad for a second. "He and I have been through a lot together."

Harry understood. Dudley treasured his cat, Pixie, and Harry knew that he'd be heartbroken when the cat died. "That's one of the things about pet ownership, though," he said. "You have to expect to outlive your pet."

Ron sighed, and the two of them bent to their work, pets forgotten for the moment.

A couple of weeks later, the big tournament finally came. All of the Furies were gathered together, waiting for the signal to go out into the Great Hall. They stood at attention in a neat row as Flitwick paced up and down in front of them, and Harry was irresistably reminded of Balalaika. The diminutive Charms professor was very like an officer inspecting troops before a battle.

"Well, children, the time is here," Flitwick said. "So far we've an unbroken string of victories. I hope that you can do it again, but don't worry too much about it if you don't. The only way I'll be disappointed is if any of you do less than your very best." He gave them a keen look from under his thick white brows.

The strains of The Entry of the Gods into Valhalla came wafting in. "Well, it's showtime," Pucey said, and he led the Furies out to the cheers of the crowd who had gathered to see them. Harry was gratified to see that there were vendors offering Coke, and that they were doing a brisk business. While duelling practices were fun, and duelling itself was a very useful skill, money in the bank was what was important at the end of the day.

To the sound of War March of the Priests, the Gladiators filed in. Harry and Dudley exchanged winks; they had found out that the characteristic music they had always associated with the circus was called "Entry of the Gladiators," by an Austrian composer, Julius Fucik. They had made some plans to try to con the Gladiators into adopting that as their theme tune, but they knew there were enough Muggle-borns about to make it an unlikely coup. Still, Harry felt, one could dream.

As always, the seventh-years went first. Harry noticed that the Gladiators had indeed been studying and practicing; some of the spellwork he saw he could not easily identify. He hoped that someone was taking notes and figuring out what the Gladiators were doing.

When Harry's turn came, he found himself facing off with Hannah Abbot, a blonde Hufflepuff. They bowed, and at the signal, began trading spells.

Harry threw up the strongest Shield Charm he could, sheltering behind it so he could take the measure of what Hannah was up to. She was using several spells he hadn't expected her to, and one of them, an odd bit of Transfiguration, got through his defenses. At first, he didn't notice anything, but then he felt himself begin to itch all over his body. As the itching got worse and worse, he forgot about duelling, scratching at himself frantically, and soon he was on the floor, neatly tied up with an Incarcerus. Hannah looked up to the judges, and Harry saw her smile as Dumbledore stood up, turned his thumb up, and intoned: "Victory goes to Hannah Abbot, of the Gladiators!" All the Hufflepuffs cheered; Harry had noticed that they stuck together very tightly.

Susan Bones was Dudley's opponent. Dudley had watched Harry carefully, and instead of hanging back and awaiting his opponent, he launched a ferocious, all-out onslaught. Susan hadn't been expecting that; it wasn't Dudley's usual style, and she had to scramble to try to keep up with his spells. Even so, after he'd seized the initiative, Dudley soon had her on the run, and ended up knocking her out cold with a well-placed Stunning Spell. He bowed slightly to the judges as his victory was announced, then gallantly went over and helped Susan up. Harry noticed that she blushed and held his hand a little longer than needful…and that Luna, beside him, was watching carefully, her eyes more narrowed than he was used to seeing. Harry figured that if Susan thought she could make a play for Dudley, Susan was in for a surprise. Dudley and Luna were devoted to each other, and while Luna was normally very laid-back, she was still a Slytherin and well able to teach an interloper to keep hands off.

Hermione and Ron squared off, and Hermione scored a fairly easy victory. Somehow, she did the same itching trick that Hannah had done, then Summoned Ron's shoes after slicking the floor, bowling him over and leaving him flat on his back and half-dazed. Scratching absently, Harry felt a moment's sympathy for his friend. Ron was proud, and didn't like to look a fool. However, when he was released, he congratulated Hermione and looked perfectly sincere about it. His brothers all gave him a cheer as he walked off the floor. While he had his differences with his brothers, they did believe in family solidarity, and he had earned their respect since coming to school.

When Luna's turn came, she found herself facing Colin Creevey. The Gryffindor smiled at her, and launched an all-out attack. Luna dodged his spells, using Shield Charms to bounce some of his spells back at him and keep him on his toes. Sometimes, she would return his fire, and she did score some hits.

Finally, though, Colin surprised her by slicking the floor under her feet, and when she dodged, her feet slid out from under her, and before she could re-orientate, she was tied up and the judges were declaring a victory for Colin. When she was released, she went over and shook his hand. "Congratulations on your victory, Colin!" she said. "You did really well!"

"Thanks, Luna! Facing off with you lot keeps me sharp!" They parted with evident good will, and the next pair of duellists came out to participate.

When the tournament was over, it was a clear victory for the Gladiators. They had taken two-thirds of the bouts, and had shown very creative use of magic in doing so. The crowd cheered, and the Furies joined in. Harry would far rather have been cheering his own team's victory, but he had many friends on the Gladiators, and was secretly rather glad of a good challenge. Balalaika had always said that a challenging opponent, whether on the battlefield or the chessboard, was the best way to improve one's own skills. Then they all trooped back to their locker rooms, and after showering and changing, headed back to their respective dormitories.

"I wonder how much we made off the Coca-Cola they sold?" Dudley wondered. Harry had actually forgotten that, being absorbed in the duelling, and when he was reminded, he wanted to know, too. But there was something else he wanted to know.

"Hey, Hermione. What was that trick that Hannah used? The one where she made me all itchy and I couldn't fight?"

Hermione smiled demurely. "It's perfectly simple Transfiguration, Harry. You were kind of sweaty, and she Transfigured the sweat into itching powder!" Harry and Dudley stared at each other, goggle-eyed.

"So simple!" Harry breathed.

"Why didn't we think of that?" Dudley murmured, looking at Hermione in awe.

"Well, you boys have always tended toward the, shall we say, baroque," Hermione explained. "When I was talking with Balalaika, she told me that successful soldiers always operate on the 'K.I.S.S. Principle."

"'K.I.S.S?'"

"Keep It Simple, Stupid." Hermione smiled proudly. "I told my team mates about that, and it worked a right charm, didn't it?"

Harry and Dudley looked at each other. In unison, they said "D'oh!" and smacked their foreheads. They had heard Balalaika talking about that before, but like idiots, they had forgotten it!

Hermione laid a hand on Harry's arm. "What are you two doing over the hols, Harry? Are you staying here at the castle?"

"We hadn't thought quite that far ahead. Yeah, we're staying here, most likely. Ron's got some sort of family business, Luna's going to be with her daddy in Sweden, and Aunt Petunia's dealing with some sort of minor crisis in Roanapur, so she can't come."

"Hmmm." Hermione visibly debated with herself for a second. "Then would you boys be willing to come and stay at my place? I've a sister and several cousins who'd love to meet you. We can share stories of our schools." Hermione smiled a secretive smile. "I think you'll find them compatible company."

"I don't see why not," Harry replied. "Where do they go to school?" He was rather curious about Muggle schools, having not seen any since he'd been in Britain.

"An all-girls' school not far from where we live. We get a deal on the tuition and fees in exchange for providing dental services."

"Where do they go? Roedean?"

"Mmmm, no. They all go to St. Trinian's."