clxxxii. sportsmanship

"You did what?!"

Hermione's shrill voice broke the stillness within their dormitory and earned several miffed complaints from the other witches sharing the space. Harriet winced.

"What's your issue now, Granger?" Pansy asked from her carrel, which had been covered in little jars and sachets and vials instead of books. She had a thick beige cream spread over half her face and looked up from her glowing mirror to glare at Hermione. "Can you stop your annoying shrieking?"

"Why? Do you require total silence to apply that nonsense to your skin?" Hermione retorted, blissfully ignoring Harriet's previous comment about trailing a stranger into the forest and stumbling upon four livid dragons. "Does noise distract your idiot brain from that insipid beauty regime?"

Pansy frowned, taken aback by Hermione's sudden vehemence. "Where do you get off talking to me like that, you frizzy-haired bint?"

"We live in this dormitory too, and you can't dictate when and where we get to make noise!"

"The rest of us deserve peace and quiet in the evening, not a rendition of your buck-toothed cackling!"

Tempers were high tonight, though Harriet wasn't sure what had crawled up Pansy's nose. Daphne went to Parkinson and muttered in her ear, while Tracy and Millicent had done the clever thing and retreated to their beds, shutting the curtains. Elara had a hand fisted in the back of Hermione's dressing gown to keep her in place, while Runcorn was halfway through painting gaudy blue lacquer on her nails, watching the spectacle with interest.

Harriet sighed. Livi poked his nose out from under her bed's skirt, the excitement in the room gaining his interest, and Harriet knew they needed to quiet down before her serpent got too interested. Sheer luck had spared her dormmates from discovering him despite sharing quarters for nearly four years.

"All right," she groused, pulling out her wand. Harriet was the only one still dressed in her uniform, having just sprinted through half the castle to reach the dorms and escape whichever staff member had almost caught her out. "Go back to smearing muck on your face and we'll quiet down."

Pansy eyed the wand, then glared at Harriet's face. "You wouldn't dare."

Harriet raised a brow and gave her wand an idle twirl. It was a bluff; she didn't need the trouble that would come along with riling Pansy and getting a prefect involved, but Pansy finally huffed and turned around. Daphne rolled her eyes and went back to the lavatory.

Harriet tossed her wand onto her bed. "Keep your voice down, Hermione, blimey. If one of those lot finds out I was out after curfew, they'll tell Snape in an instant."

"And what were you doing out so late?" Hermione demanded in a whisper. "You know it's dangerous with the Minister making any excuse he can to pop by the school!"

"Let's be honest. It's dangerous even without that berk going around."

From her spot sitting on the edge of Hermione's bed, Elara said, "Take this seriously, Harriet," and Harriet stuck out her tongue. Hermione gathered her familiar up into her arms and stroked his fur with agitated motions, Crookshanks purring like mad.

"Did you miss the bit where I told you about dragons being on the grounds? That's much more interesting than breaking curfew."

"Dragons," Hermione said with a downward twist of her lips, as if she'd tasted something gross. "What are they thinking, using dragons? I thought the Ministry was intent on keeping the Tournament as safe as possible—and as safe as possible does not include dragons."

"There was always going to be some danger involved," Harriet said as she plopped onto her own bed, fishing Kevin out from where he attempted to hide in her pillowcase. The golem wriggled in her cupped palm, tongue flicking wildly, maybe smelling her previous proximity to the dragons in question. "But what d'you suppose the champions are meant to do? Surely they're not going to have to kill them?"

"Oh, goodness no." Hermione shook her head. "That would break several international laws on the protection and preservation of endangered magical species. The Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures wouldn't allow the dragons to come to harm for a game."

Elara blew a short breath through her lips, but if she had something scathing to say about the Ministry, she kept it to herself. "It's probably like the stories." When Hermione and Harriet turned to her, puzzled, she explained. "They used to let us read fairy tales in—where I was before. Well, if the stories had strong Christian allegories in them, that is. In several versions, there'd be dragons, and the main character would need to steal from its hoard."

Hermione considered this information. Harriet, meanwhile, asked, "What's the Christian allegory in stealing from a great ruddy lizard?"

Elara shrugged one shoulder. "The evils of greed, I suppose."

Harriet snorted.

Not long afterward, she rose and gathered her things to use the bathroom and get ready for bed. She spent an inordinate amount of time flattening her hair, the fringe refusing to lie flat, and as she studied herself in the mirror, Harriet suddenly recalled how she'd come to find the dragons in the first place.

Of course, she hadn't forgotten who she'd followed or seen, but she hadn't considered the implications of their presence until now. Karkaroff and Madame Maxime had both learned about the dragons, which meant the Headmasters of both Beauxbatons and Durmstrang knew about the first task. The champions were meant to be kept in the dark about their upcoming trials—but Harriet doubted Delacour or Krum would be walking into things blind.

Really, she shouldn't care. She had far too many more pressing concerns, including Slytherin and her first impending Animagus transformation attempt. She needed to wait for the first lightning storm of the season and concentrate on her meditations, but Harriet already felt sick to her stomach when she thought of all the ways it could go wrong. The Triwizard Tournament should be the last thing on her mind. She shouldn't care a wit if the other schools cheated.

Still, the competition loomed like a thunderhead over Harriet's head that evening, humming in the background of her unsettled dreams and dimming her mood in the morning. The more she thought of it, the more irritated she grew. Dumbledore wouldn't tell anyone about the task; no, he might twist rules here and there, but Hogwarts' Headmaster never liked handing out unfair advantages. Neither Diggory or Longbottom would have a clue what they were about to face.

Harriet stabbed her eggs with unintended gusto, startling first-year Basil Shacklebolt into slopping pumpkin juice down his front.

The task would begin tomorrow morning. Harriet scowled at her food as the owls delivered the morning post, and she flicked through her letters—one from Narcissa Malfoy, Lockhart, and Mr. Flamel, the latter dropped by his eye-catching raven. She stuffed them away in her robe pocket to sort later and cut her eyes down the table toward Victor Krum. Unfortunately, he chose that moment to lift his head, and he caught her looking.

Harriet returned her attention to her plate.

Breakfast came to an end, and Harriet gathered her satchel with the others, turning her path toward the dungeons.

"Double-Potions is always a nightmare," Elara grumbled as she swilled the last of her tea and pulled a face at the cooling dregs. "Four hours in the frigid dungeons, listening to Snape lecture amid the most odious smelling concoctions known to man. I loathe it."

"We're brewing the Somnus Lucidity Draft potion today." Hermione had a skip in her step, her eyes bright and determined. "It's devilishly difficult, according to the text. The layering of the various liquid viscosities is going to be especially challenging. The potion is supposed to make the imbiber more receptive to portents in their sleep—not that I strictly believe that's possible."

Elara let out a loud, annoyed sigh. "Spare me the Divinations tirade this morning, Hermione, please. I will need what energy I have to make something even mildly acceptable today. Snape will have me in Remedial Potions on the weekends if I don't improve my grade."

They crossed paths with a group of Hufflepuffs, the bright yellow of one girl's scarf catching Harriet's eye. She stopped so quickly that Elara almost ran into her.

"What are you doing?"

"I just need a second—."

She turned and called out to the older students. "Hey, Cedric!" They paused, and Harriet suddenly found herself the center of attention, the three seventh-year Hufflepuffs girls—including Ursula Hinde and bloody Petunia Squabs—sneering as she approached Diggory.

Cedric smiled at her, and the expression warmed his chiseled face and gray eyes. The witches at Hogwarts had always fawned over him, Harriet knew. He was handsome and friendly, a tall, marginally well-off pure-blood from a decent family who'd been Quidditch captain and did well in all his classes. A catch, really.

He'd always been kind to her when they met, most often on the track by the lake, matching pace to chat for a while as they ran. Sometimes his kindness irritated Harriet because ungrateful cows like Hinde and Squabs took advantage of it. She thought Cedric too naive for his own good.

Professor Dumbledore once told her Hufflepuffs are brave enough to be kind even when it'd be easier to hate. Harriet could understand the sentiment, but that didn't stop her from disliking how unforgivably soft it made some people.

Hinde leaned in and whispered something in Squabs' ear. Squabs smiled, her perfectly glossed lips twisting. "Nice shirt, Potter."

Harriet didn't answer her, though she did glance down for half a second. A bit of yolk speckled her blouse—most likely splattered when she stabbed her eggs. Harriet's cheeks warmed against her wishes, and Squabs and Hinde snickered.

"Did you need something, Potter?" Cedric asked.

"Er—yeah. Can I talk to you for a moment? Alone?"

Squabs and Hinde and the third witch Harriet couldn't recall the name of started to whisper in earnest, their eyes fixed on the side of Harriet's face like javelins as she gestured Cedric over to an alcove several meters off. A statue once resided there, gone now, nothing remaining aside from a cracked plinth and the shadow of an old nameplate. It was private enough they wouldn't be overheard, at least.

"Dragons," Harriet said without preamble, peeking about to make certain no one was listening. "The first task is dragons."

Cedric blinked, and his eyes widened as the hand holding his bag's strap tightened. "Wh—? What do you mean, dragons? How do you know?"

"Because I've seen them," Harriet stressed. She was going to be late for Potions at this rate. "They've got them on the grounds in the forest, keeping them sedated."

"And how do you know they're for the task? No one's supposed to know beforehand."

Harriet snorted. "Well, Krum and Delacour know. I saw Maxime and Karkaroff there. And I can't be entirely certain they're for the task; it's not like I had a nice chat with the handlers, did I? But there were four of them, and do you see any other reason to import four dragons from the continent when your task is tomorrow?" Diggory didn't appear entirely convinced, and Harriet wanted to smack the twit on the head. She might have if she weren't so short. "Elara reckons they're going to have you steal something from it because of the laws against harming dragons. So you're most likely going to have to distract it or outmaneuver it—which I don't recommend, by the way. They're huge."

Cedric mulled this information over, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. Eventually, he decided Harriet must be trustworthy enough to believe, as he said, "Thank you—but why tell me?"

"What do you mean, why tell you? Krum and Delacour know, of course."

"Why not tell Longbottom?"

Harriet couldn't help herself—she laughed. The sound earned vicious glares from the Hufflepuff witches, and Harriet's own friends—waiting farther off—raised speculative brows.

"If Longbottom wants to strut about pretending he's the cleverest sod in the world, and that the Goblet selected him because he's too special to pass by, then he can find the information out for himself. I want Hogwarts to win, not Neville Longbottom."

"You're…not a fan of his, are you?"

Harriet sniffed. "He stalked me for the better part of a year, thinking I was the Heir of Slytherin."

Whatever Diggory thought she might say, that wasn't it. "What? Really?" he sputtered.

"Really." Harriet leaned to the side to peer down the corridor, fewer and fewer people lingering as class drew closer. "I need to go."

"Right. Me too." Cedric stepped out of the alcove and gestured for Harriet to go ahead of him. "Thanks for the info, Potter."

"You're welcome."

She passed Squabs on the way back to her friends, and the older witch hissed something Harriet didn't catch. She pretended not to care.

"What was that about?" Hermione asked with a nod toward the backs of the retreating Hufflepuffs. Harriet shrugged her shoulders.

"Oh, just having a quick chat is all."

"No—not Cedric. I know what you were doing there. What was that between you and Petunia Squabs?"

Harriet's mouth scrunched into a grimace. She hadn't told her friends about her run-in with Squabs, Hinde, and Fogs, or the nasty things they'd said about her. She'd much rather try to forget it ever happened.

Nearby, Greengrass and Parkinson had stopped to see the scene unfold, and they shared knowing looks. "They probably thought you were going to ask him to the dance, Potter," Pansy said. "That's what we thought, anyway. I wanted to see you get rejected."

"Get stuffed, Parkinson." Harriet frowned at her, confused. "But what are you talking about? What dance?"

"The Yule Ball, of course."

"That what?"

Again, Daphne and Pansy exchanged looks, flipping their glossy hair, and Harriet hoped they got told off by Snape for not tying it back. "The Yule Ball. It's traditional for the Triwizard Tournament to include a seasonal ball that you have to attend with a date. I thought Granger already read everything there is to know about the competition."

All eyes shifted to Hermione, who blushed and cleared her throat. "I paid more attention to the rules and laws and past tasks. There was no mention of any ball."

Pansy's eyes rolled. "Typical. What else did you think the dress robes were for?"

"What dress robes?"

"Our letters this summer included a dress robe requirement! Merlin, are you three dense?"

Harriet's stomach churned like an untended cauldron, her breakfast threatening to make a reappearance. "We never read the page about the clothes! It's the same every bloody year!"

"Hmph. This year it was different." Pansy tossed her hair again and stuck her short nose in the air. Something like triumph glinted in her eyes, and Harriet knew she felt vindicated after their confrontation last night. "No dates, no robes. I bet you don't even know how to dance! You'd better start thinking about it. Yule will be here before you know it, and you don't want to be the only loser not in attendance."

Pansy and Daphne pranced off, pleased with themselves, while Harriet and the others followed. One glance at her friends showed they wore the same grim expression she did.

Suddenly, Harriet was looking forward to the Yule holidays a lot less.