"Maybe the Draught of Peace as a start…and some anti-poison potions for when it comes about," Zarif mutters to himself as he reads through an entire encyclopedia book on potions Hermione found for him in the library. Something she hopes he will learn and win with.
At the moment, he sits in the Great Hall, waiting with everyone for the champion naming ceremony to start as they chatter and fill the stone room with echoing laughter and excited whispers and talks. Even some mutters and clinking of coins tell anyone that bets are happening at this moment.
Many keep craning their necks every so often to see if Dumbledore has finished. The tension is starting to become thick like the drawing of lots for a major sporting event to see how the brackets would be for a big tournament.
At long last, the golden plates return to their original spotless state; there is a sharp upswing in the level of noise within the Hall, which dies away almost instantly as Dumbledore gets to his feet. On either side of him, Professor Karkaroff and Madame Maxime look as tense and expectant as anyone. Ludo Bagman is beaming and winking at various students. Mr. Crouch, however, looks quite uninterested, almost bored.
"Well, the goblet is almost ready to make its decision, I estimate that it requires one more minute. Now, when the champions' names are called, I would ask them to please come up to the top of the Hall, walk along with the staff table, and go through into the next chamber," he indicates the door behind the staff table, "Where they will be receiving their first instructions."
He takes out his wand and gives a great sweeping wave with it; at once, all the candles except those inside the carved pumpkins are extinguished, plunging them into a state of semidarkness. The Goblet of Fire now shines more brightly than anything in the whole Hall, the sparkling bright, bluey-whiteness of the flames almost painful on the eyes. Everyone watches, waiting…a few people even keep checking their watches…
"Any second," Lee Jordan whispers, a few seats away from Zarif.
The flames inside the goblet turn suddenly red again. Sparks begin to fly from it. The next moment, a tongue of flame shoots into the air, a charred piece of parchment flutters out of it, and with it the whole room gasps.
Dumbledore catches the piece of parchment and holds it at arm's length so that he can read it by the light of the flames, which has turned back to blue-white.
"The champion for Durmstrang," he reads, in a strong, clear voice, "will be Viktor Krum."
"No surprises there!" Ron yells as a storm of applause and cheering sweeps the Hall. Harry sees Viktor Krum rise from the Slytherin table and slouches up towards Dumbledore; he turns right, walks along with the staff table, and disappears through the door into the next chamber.
'Yeah, they never said what the criteria of the selection are. For all we know the headmaster of the school could influence it completely,' Zarif thinks as he watches.
"Bravo, Viktor!" Karkaroff booms, so loudly that everyone could hear him, even over all the applause. "Knew you had it in you!"
The clapping and chattering then die down. Now everyone's attention is focused again on the goblet, which, seconds later, turns red once more. The second piece of parchment shoots out of it, propelled by the flames.
"The champion for Beauxbatons," Dumbledore calls, "is Fleur Delacour!"
"It's her, Ron!" Harry shouts as the girl who so resembles a veela gets gracefully to her feet, shakes back her sheet of silvery blonde hair, and is swept up between the Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff tables.
"Oh look, they're all disappointed," Hermione says over the noise, nodding toward the remainder of the Beauxbatons' party, some of who are breaking down in tears.
When Fleur Delacour vanishes into the side chamber, silence falls again, but this time it is silence so stiff with excitement you can almost taste it. The Hogwarts champion is next…
And the Goblet of Fire turns red once more; sparks shower out of it; the tongue of flame shoots high into the air, and from its tip, Dumbledore pulls the third piece of parchment. "The Hogwarts champion," he called, "is Cedric Diggory!"
"No!" Ron calls loudly, but nobody hears him except Harry and Zarif much to his annoyance; the uproar from the next table is too great. Every single Hufflepuff jumps to his or her feet, screaming and stamping, as Cedric makes his way past them, grinning broadly, and heads off toward the chamber behind the teachers' table. Indeed, the applause for Cedric goes on so long, that it is some time before Dumbledore can make himself heard again.
"Excellent!" Dumbledore calls happily as at last, the tumult dies down. "Well, we now have our three champions. I am sure I can count upon all of you, including the remaining students from Beauxbatons and Durmstrang, to give your champions every ounce of support you can muster. By cheering your champion on, you will contribute in a very real…" But Dumbledore suddenly stops speaking, and it is apparent to everybody what has him distracted. The fire in the goblet turns red again. Sparks are flying out of it. A long flame shoots suddenly into the air, and borne upon it is another piece of parchment. Automatically, it seems, Dumbledore reaches out a long hand and seizes the parchment.
"Oh, that is bad," Zarif says, knowing someone had interfered with the selection process and now someone was in a magical contract to compete in a very dangerous competition.
At the top table, Professor Dumbledore straightens up, nodding to Professor McGonagall. "Harry Potter!" he calls again. "Harry! Up here, if you please!"
"Go on," Hermione whispers, giving Harry a slight push.
Harry gets to his feet, trod on the hem of his robes, and stumbles slightly. He sets off through the gap between the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff tables. It feels like an immensely long walk; the top table doesn't seem to be getting any nearer at all, and he can feel hundreds and hundreds of eyes upon him, as though each is a searchlight. The buzzing grows louder and louder. After what seems like an hour, he is right in front of Dumbledore, feeling the stares of all the teachers upon him.
Harry proceeds up to the back room and Zarif's eyes land on Ron who starts to look very jealous. "Ron, stop those thoughts now," Zarif instructs.
"How can I not? Harry is chosen. Cedric is chosen. How can I not be if it was that easy?" Ron complains, turning to the boy.
"Ron, do you not understand how bad this is? If not, let me give you a hint. One of the favorite choices for the first task in the Tri-Wizard cup before it was stopped involved having to deal with live dragons by yourself," Zarif whispers to him harshly, even grabbing his collar to pull him closer to emphasize this. "This could be a death sentence for Harry," Zarif whispers to him and Ron's eyes widen as the words echo in his mind. Zarif then turns to the artifact, his mind already working on this before turning to the Slytherin table, giving many of his friends who are looking at him, a signal that they will need to talk soon.
The next morning, Zarif forwent his breakfast and is outside the castle where they wouldn't be overheard. His friends joined him and Merula even brought along Dracona. "Your thoughts on this?" Zarif asks the Slytherins that join him.
"Nuts and crazy. And that it is almost impossible for Potter to be chosen for two reasons at once. Both age and already chosen champion," Dracona lists off.
"Not to mention it produced the fourth paper. No, someone messed with the Artifact and the one who did it must be powerful," Daxar points out.
"This already reminds me of our second year. Someone is making a move. Our suspects are all the teachers and visiting headmasters and officials. Anyone else would have been stopped by Dumbledore's age line…unless someone is not as young as they appear…pop quiz. What potions do these ingredients have in common? Boomslang skin and Gillyweed," Zarif asks.
"Polyjuice potion?" Merula guesses, raising an eyebrow at him. "What about it?"
"Bingo. In preparation for the championship, professor Snape has been allowing me to use some of his rarer ingredients from his personal stores, and guess what we recently discovered missing?" Zarif asks.
"Polyjuice ingredients…so the question becomes who is stealing them?" Daxar proposes.
"We have a rat in our school…maybe multiple. Someone is not who they seem to be," Zarif informs the six. "Be careful of who you talk to now. We don't know who they are, but one thing is obvious. The one behind this is smart and powerful."
"We aren't going to face a giant snake under their command are we?" Onelle asks, smirking over at him.
"We didn't last time and the ministry confirmed the Basilisk that was a resident of Hogwarts for so long was dead and has been for over a year now. So unless they can smuggle something like that in, assume no, but that isn't to say we can let our guards down. Anyone could be our imposter, even be one of the visitors from another school and we can't rule out there are multiple either. So for now keep your mouths shut about this and watch everyone carefully. And Dracona, I know you dislike Harry, but please do not mess with him. He already has a target on him even if he currently doesn't realize it himself yet," Zarif informs.
Dracona frowns before turning her head away as she blushes a little. "I'm not that harsh."
"Now, I have to deal with Hufflepuff. They will get their collective panties in a twist as their house was supposed to be representing Hogwarts for this tournament since, let's face it, out of the four houses, they are the least distinguished," Zarif mutters to himself.
"Oh. Good luck with that. They would be a mess," Avae chuckles.
The next few days are hectic, the Slytherin house not helping with their ways of trying to provoke Harry the best they could despite Merula, Dracona, and their group staying out of it. Zarif didn't get away from it either as a few decided it would be funny to try to provoke him. They even got some of the Hufflepuffs to help. One attempt involved throwing a potted plant at him from a floor above him as he walked through a hallway. Needless to say, Zarif knew their faces and names from then on. A set of them which he shares with Cedric and his Slytherin friends so they could take care of it in-house.
It was later when he and Harry are pulled out of potions class by a request and Zarif has the displeasure of meeting Rita Skeeter. Already he can tell she is bad news, but not one he can avoid being a reporter. More like a tabloid writer though. Someone who specifically writes something to sell rumors. Zarif is actually a bit surprised as he is sure Rita is under suspicion of being involved in the debacle at the Quidditch World Cup if not being aware it was going to happen beforehand.
It is a few days later when they receive the result of Rita's short interviews. Harry's is a bit of a glowing one, making Zarif suspicious as Rita has a reputation of writing very negatively half the time, lying through more than half of them. It is then he turns to the next page and finds what he has been expecting. 'Pureblood: A dignified lineage or inbreeding society.' Reading through it, it barely mentions him except revealing his condition and mostly citing examples of known death eaters imprisoned and mental health issues of some purebloods. To say the mood of the Slytherins specifically is dark and angry was a bit of an understatement.
"I hope that woman doesn't notice me hanging out with you," Merula mutters, reading the paper she got. She then looks up and sighs at Zarif. "I would hate it if my history gets yours messed up."
"They are mad at Rita," Zarif informs as he sees many starts talking amongst themselves at the two tables.
Merula sighs, closing the paper. "I really want to damage her reputation…but I have a feeling she can spin that on me."
"You and half the ministry for all the years of abuse," Zarif adds.
Merula raises an eyebrow at him unconvinced. "You got a plan yourself?"
"No, I got more important things to do than let her get under my skin," Zarif informs.
Merula now smirks. "Is it…get lost in a forest and see if you can survive just making potions?" she jokes.
"So how did handling what I told you about go?" Zarif asks.
Merula hums, leaning back in her seat. "Well…we found some of them…taught them a lesson…and then another…" she explains before seeing him smirking. "They lived…mostly," she adds, joking before chuckling with Zarif.
"We should have spit poison in their eyes," Critic says.
"Now we can't do that. Otherwise, they won't see what else we can do," Planner points out.
"I want more chicken legs," Dreamer chimes in.
Zarif sighs and shakes his head amused before sliding a plate of meaty food from different animals over to them. "Don't get fat and have to be rolling around," he warns half-heartedly.
"Don't worry about that. We can adjust our metabolism to suit our needs," Planner informs before the other two heads shush it like they couldn't give that kind of information away.
Zarif raises an eyebrow and leans down to them. "Sorry…what?"
Elixir didn't say anything, keeping their mouths intentionally full as an excuse. "I see, so this Tuesday is the first task. From what I have seen of Harry, it's really making him worry. It's a shame we can't help him," Zarif says, turning back to Merula, letting Elixir off for now.
Merula shakes her head. "Hard in his case. I mean…he isn't old enough and somehow is playing the game. So of course that would tick off most of them who wanted to play. And doesn't help that Cedric is already playing…it just adds to the mess," she mentions, looking towards Cedric as he is talking and interacting with his friends from his house.
"Not to mention you can easily categorize this as blood sport because people have died," Zarif adds.
"And the other schools being here doesn't help either. I mean…two schools with their own champions but Hogwarts has two, that is almost an insult to them I would say," she guesses, shrugging it off.
"I kinda think they are fools. They got wrapped up in the glory and prize, but I doubt they know what they got into," Zarif mutters low enough so only she could hear him as Morgana starts to run around the tables with some first-year Slytherins.
Merula nods before smiling at Morgana as she barks and chases the kids around. "Does anyone? I mean, we always hear of the champions and the prizes."
"Yeah, I guess that just makes me the odd one out. I know what I am getting into all too well," Zarif jokes.
Merula rolls her eyes amused. "Well…you are entering a different tournament."
Tuesday soon comes around and Harry seems more worried than ever. It isn't until the night before that Zarif learns why. Dragons. Stealing an egg from a dragon by yourself. Someone definitely wanted to have someone die from this is all Zarif can think of as he takes a seat in the stands to watch. As it starts, Zarif is reminded of the first dragon he had ever seen. The same one whose heartstring now made up the core of one of his wands. He takes out the ancient wand and sighs as he looks it over. The old magic flowing through it seems to give him a good tingle through his hands before he looks up at the dragon waiting in the rocky arena below. 'Sorry about your ancient family member, big guy.'
The first to do the task was Cedric and he faced a Swedish Short-Snout. He used a transfiguration spell to change a rock into a dog to distract the dragon. An interesting idea, but he was only partially successful as the dragon took the bait, and Cedric went for the Golden Egg. Halfway through, the dragon turned its attention back to Cedric and burned his face. Cedric had retrieved the egg by that point as he screamed in pain as witches and wizards swarmed out to stop the dragon before it could do more. "Good thing we have magical healing or Cedric would be losing any handsome features of his face," Dracona comments as many wince at that injury with some of the older girls calling out in horror.
Zarif raises an eyebrow at her before humming. "The rules state they must grab the egg and leave or just get the egg and run away a little to count as a win? Because they did intervene to stop it."
"They only said get the egg," Merula informs, shrugging her shoulders beside him.
"Ah, then…no. Maybe someone will have the bright idea to do that," Zarif says, stopping himself from saying something.
"Hum…smaller than the dragons we saw so long ago with our master in Egypt," Critic comments.
"I will be questioning that," Zarif mentions and hears a shush from the other two heads to the third. "Or not…" he adds afterward.
Next was Fleur Delacour, who faced a Common Welsh Green. She enchanted the dragon to sleep, but while retrieving the golden egg, the dragon snored and let out a jet of flame that set her skirt alight. She did manage to extinguish the flames with a water spell and then retrieved her egg.
"Ok, outside the box thinking, but points off for letting down her guard at the end there," Dracona comments.
"Never turn your back on an animal, even when sleeping. I don't think they got hippogriff training as we did," Zarif chuckles as he remembers that lesson.
"Well Hagrid's choices are unusual, if not a bit unorthodox," Merula adds.
Zarif hums. "I think it's common hunter knowledge. Like ask a hunter and they might say the same thing about a bear or wolf," he mentions and sees Dracona staring off into dead air towards the arena in a trance. "Dracona, you okay?" he asks and sees her blink and blush towards him in surprise.
"Oh yeah, fine," she quickly says, waving him off.
The third is Viktor Krum, facing a Chinese Fireball. He used the Conjunctivitis Curse to blind the dragon and retrieve his egg. However, he ends up with docked points when the dragon stumbles around and smashes half of the real eggs.
"Yeah, brute force your way through because that always works," Zarif says sarcastically as he facepalms.
"Wow…if I was that dragon, I would be one pissed hot-headed lizard," Merula comments, seeing Zarif shake his head in his hand.
"You would be one angry mother, that is for sure," Zarif adds, sighing as his wand even sparks his hand somehow for once. 'Ow…very interesting…maybe you can feel the dragon's emotion and anger?' he thinks as he looks at his older wand.
"That just leaves Potter," one of the nearby seats says.
"Fred and George have his numbers at seventy-five to one. I bet on his fancy hair getting burned," another student from Slytherin laughs.
"I have a feeling they saved the worst dragon for last," Zarif mutters and is proven correct when the fireball is gotten out of the arena, and in came a Hungarian Horntail, a real nasty one at that. Zarif wonders if it is also in the breeding season, making it more dangerous. "Hey…do you three know about various seasons for other animals?" he asks down to Elixir.
"Are you asking if it's in heat?" Critic asks.
"If so, then we can confirm it. Making it most likely twice as dangerous especially smelling the other crushed dragon eggs," Planner finishes.
"That can set it off? How?" Zarif asks curiously, wondering if that can be used as some form of advantage.
"The scent of dead dragons, even if not hatched yet," Dreamer answers simply.
"Oh, that is perfect. Krum made this challenge even worse for Harry," Zarif says facepalming.
"Maybe that was on purpose?" Dracona suggests, shrugging at the thought. "I mean, it was a bit obvious from how Karkaroff was acting."
"I don't think he is thinking that far ahead with the ten he gave Krum. He is obviously very partisan," Zarif says as he was the only one to give a ten so far.
"What do you mean?" Merula asks.
"According to Elixir here, that dragon is in heat and dragons are more protective of their young at this time and the scent of smashed dragon eggs is still down there. If I didn't know better, I could call that intentional murder attempt," Zarif informs, not keeping it down so the rest could hear him.
And even Fred and George hear this as they grin at each other. "Place your bets! Place your bets! The odds are now one hundred fifty to one!" they both yell together as everyone nearby who hears him starts to whisper the reason why the odds changed.
"Do you two want to go broke? Because if you don't knock it off, I will make a bet with you that will make it so," Zarif informs and the two shut up and sit back down immediately.
"Why not anyway?" Planner suggests, grinning back at him with the other two heads smirking.
"Because I am their friend," Zarif informs them, not even bother replying in parseltongue.
Soon Harry emerges as they all watched. Word already has spread about how Krum's actions made this even harder. It is touch and goes for a bit at the start as the Horntail is constantly on him, but when Harry gets a moment to act he yells, "Accio Firebolt!" Zarif, who has started to smile when he hears the spell, gains a confused look of why not go straight for the egg with that spell. Within moments though, the broom comes in and Harry quickly mounts it and soars up into the air. The whole crowd and the dragon watch this before he dives. The Horntail's head follows him as it is telegraphing what it is going to do and Harry pulls out of the dive just in time as a jet of fire has been released exactly where he would have been having he not swerved away.
"Great Scott, he can fly!" yells Bagman as the crowd shrieks and gasps. "Are you watching this, Mr. Krum?" Harry soars higher in a circle with the Horntail still following his progress; its head revolving on its long neck.
Harry plummets just as the Horntail opens its mouth, but this time he was less lucky. He missed the flames, but the tail came whipping up to meet him instead, and as he swerved to the left, one of the long spikes grazed his shoulder, ripping his robes. Merula winces at that. "Tail had to have nicked him," she observes.
Harry doesn't let up though. He zooms around the back of the Horntail, but the Horntail doesn't seem to want to take off, she is too protective of her eggs. Though she writhes and twists, furling and unfurling her wings and keeping those fearsome yellow eyes on Harry, she is afraid to move too far from them. It is becoming obvious that he needs to persuade her to do it, or he'd never get near them and get his goal, the golden egg. The trick is to do it carefully, gradually. Harry begins to fly, first this way, then the other, not near enough to make her breathe fire to stave him off, but still posing a sufficient threat to ensure she keeps her eyes on him. Her head sways this way and that, watching him out of those vertical pupils, her fangs bared. "She is getting antsy, it appears," Dracona comments.
Harry flies higher. The Horntail's head rises with him, her neck now stretched to its fullest extent, still swaying, like a snake before its charmer. Harry rises a few more feet, and she lets out a roar of exasperation. He is like a fly to her, a fly she is longing to swat. Her tail thrashes again, but he is too high to reach now. She shoots fire into the air, which he dodges. Her jaws open wide…then she rears, spreading her great, black, leathery wings at last, as wide as those of a small airplane and Harry sees his opening and dives. Before the dragon knows what he has done, or where he disappears to, he is speeding towards the ground as fast as he can go, toward the eggs now unprotected by her clawed front legs. Harry takes his hands off his Firebolt, he has seized the Golden Egg. With a huge spurt of speed, he is off, he is soaring out over the stands, the heavy egg safely under his uninjured arm. "He has it," Zarif says smirking, watching him fly over.
"Look at that!" Bagman is yelling. "Will you look at that! Our youngest champion is the quickest to get his egg! Well, this is going to shorten the odds on Mr. Potter!" With that, the dragon keepers rush forward to subdue the
Horntail is now furious and starts spewing fire everywhere in her rage. The keepers are struggling to contain the great beast as they start launching stupify spells altogether. It takes around sixty repeated hits before the great beast collapses to the ground with a final roar of defiance.
"I still say he should have distracted the dragon with a noise elsewhere and then accio the egg, maybe an ice spell to counter the dragon's fire and protego if it comes in with its tail," Zarif mentions.
Both girls near him sweatdrop. He is like this with every duel tournament and even the world cup. No one leaves the stands, wanting to see how the judges score Harry. In the end, Madame Maxime raises her wand in the air. What looks like a long silver ribbon shoots out of it, which twists itself into a large figure eight. Mr. Crouch comes next. He shoots a number nine into the air. Next, Dumbledore. He too puts up a nine. The crowd is cheering harder than ever. Ludo Bagman a ten. This one gets a cocked eyebrow from Zarif as something seems off about that. Finally, Karkaroff raises his wand. He pauses for a moment, and then a number shoots out of his wand. The shape becomes a four.
"Booo! You biased favoritest crook!" Zarif calls out before many of the audience join in, decrying the headmaster. Even the Slytherins and the other schools start to mostly join in with this decrying, but Karkaroff didn't change his score.
"Wow," Merula voices simply, seeing Zarif's reaction and not his usual stoic demeanor.
"This is a first," Dracona chuckles while watching Zarif which shows he can get carried away as well.
Zarif stops before shutting up as he glances between the two. "Don't say a word about this and let the audience drown it out."
"Oh?" Merula asks and even Morgana gives him a smirk.
Zarif starts to look between all the girls before groaning and quickly changes into his animagus and gives a squawk at them. He then flies off, heading towards the infirmary tent to check up on Harry and see how he and Cedric are doing.
"Hey!" Merula complains, changing into her animagus form as well and running off through the exits of the stands and towards the tent as well.
Dracona glances where the two went before turning her gaze at Morgana and Elixir. "Come on," she sighs, letting the snake slither onto her arm while letting Morgana follow her out.