"Ladies and gentlemen, in five minutes' time, I will be asking you to make your way down to the Quidditch field for the third and final task of the Triwizard Tournament. Will the champions please follow Mr. Bagman down to the stadium now. "
Harry got up. The Gryffindors all along the table were applauding him; His friends all wished him good luck, and he headed off out of the Great Hall with Cedric, Fleur, and Viktor.
"Feeling all right. Harry?" Bagman asked as they went down the stone steps onto the grounds. "Confident?"
"I'm okay," said Harry. It was sort of true; he was nervous, but he kept running over all the hexes and spells he had been practicing in his mind as they walked, and the knowledge that he could remember them all made him feel better.
They walked onto the Quidditch field, which was now completely unrecognizable. A twenty-foot-high hedge ran all the way around the edge of it. There was a gap right in front of them: the entrance to the vast maze. The passage beyond it looked dark and creepy.
Five minutes later, the stands had begun to fill; the air was full of excited voices and the rumbling of feet as the hundreds of students filed into their seats. The sky was a deep, clear blue now, and the first stars were starting to appear. Hagrid, Professor Moody, Professor McGonagall, and Professor Flitwick came walking into the stadium and approached Bagman and the champions. They were wearing large, red, luminous stars on their hats, all except Hagrid, who had his on the back of his moleskin vest.
"We are going to be patrolling the outside of the maze," said Professor McGonagall to the champions. "If you get into difficulty, and wish to be rescued, send red sparks into the air, and one of us will come and get you, do you understand?"
The champions nodded.
"Off you go, then!" said Bagman brightly to the four patrollers.
"Good luck. Harry," Hagrid whispered, and the four of them walked away in different directions, to station themselves around the maze. Bagman now pointed his wand at his throat, muttered, "Sonorus," and his magically magnified voice echoed into the stands.
"Ladies and gentlemen, the third and final task of the Triwizard Tournament is about to begin! Let me remind you how the points currently stand! In first place, with 92 points, is Mr. Harry Potter, from Hogw- err Emrys Academy!" The cheers and applause sent birds from the Forbidden Forest fluttering into the darkening sky. "He is followed by Mr. Cedric Diggory with 85 points." Cheers erupted again from the Hogwarts "In third place, with 83 points - Mr. Viktor Krum, of Durmstrang Institute!" More applause. "And last but not least- Miss Fleur Delacour, of Beauxbatons Academy with 72 points!"
"So. . . on my whistle, Harry, you may begin. Mr. Diggory will follow after 2 minutes has elapsed, then Mr. Krum, and finally Miss Delacour." said Bagman. "Three - two - one -"
He gave a short blast on his whistle causing Harry to draw his wand and dart off into the maze.
The towering hedges cast black shadows across the path, and, whether because they were so tall and thick or because they had been enchanted, the sound of the surrounding crowd was silenced the moment he entered the maze. Harry felt almost as though he were underwater again. He immediately cast a modified lumos charm, causing a ball of light to shoot from the end of his wand and hover slightly above and behind him. This variant was much more useful during combat as it didn't require the user to constantly emit light from the wand, freeing him up to cast other spells.
After lighting the area and gaining his bearings he moved forward until he found a fork in the path. He closed his eyes and pushed out with his magic. He wasn't perfect with his sensory abilities, but he could feel large sources of magic for several meters in every direction. He could no longer feel the other contestants behind him, reaffirming that the maze was enchanted. He couldn't feel anything ahead of him down either path, so he decided to go left and departed once more.
Harry heard Bagman's whistle for the second time. Cedric had now entered the maze, meaning he had been at it for two minutes already. Harry subconsciously sped up. His chosen path seemed completely deserted. He turned right, and hurried on, holding his wand always at the ready. Still, there was nothing in sight.
Bagman's whistle blew in the distance for the third time. 4 minutes in, and Krum was now entering.
Harry kept his head on a swivel, checking beside and behind him constantly. The old feeling that he was being watched was upon him. The maze was growing darker with every passing minute as the sky overhead deepened to navy. He had so far been sabotaged twice by whoever put him in this blasted tournament and wouldn't be surprised if it happened again.
He came to a second forked path. "Point Me," he whispered to his wand, holding it flat in his palm.
The wand spun around once and pointed toward his right, into solid hedge. That way was north, and he knew that he needed to go northwest for the center of the maze. The best he could do was to take the left fork and go right again as soon as possible.
He reached out once more with his magic and discovered that the path ahead was empty too. He soon reached a right turn and took it, he again found his way unblocked. Harry didn't know why, but the lack of obstacles was unnerving him. Surely he should have met something by now? It felt as though the maze were luring him into a false sense of security. Then he heard movement right behind him. He held out his wand, ready to attack, but its beam fell only upon Cedric, who had just hurried out of a path on the right-hand side. Cedric looked severely shaken. The sleeve of his robe was smoking.
"Hagrid's Merlin-be-Damned Blast-Ended Skrewts!" he hissed. "They're enormous - I only just got away!"
He shook his head and dived out of sight, along another path. Keen to put plenty of distance between himself and the skrewts, Harry hurried off again. Then, as he turned a corner, he saw a dementor gliding toward him. Twelve feet tall, its face hidden by its hood, its rotting, scabbed hands outstretched, it advanced, sensing its way blindly toward him. Harry could hear its rattling breath; he felt clammy coldness stealing over him but knew what he had to do…
He summoned his happiest memories, and raised his wand. "Expecto Patronum!"
A silver stag erupted from the end of Harry's wand and galloped toward the dementor, which fell back and tripped over the hem of its robes. . . . Harry had never seen a dementor stumble.
"Hang on!" he almost whispered, advancing in the wake of his silver Patronus, "A fucking boggart. Riddikulus!"
There was a loud crack, and the shape-shifter exploded in a wisp of smoke. The silver stag faded from sight. Harry wished it could have stayed, he could have used some company. . . but he moved on, quickly and quietly as possible, listening hard.
Left. . . right. . . left again. . . Twice he found himself facing dead ends. He did the Four-Point Spell again and found that he was going too far east. He turned back, took a right turn, and saw an odd golden mist floating ahead of him.
Harry approached it cautiously, pointing the wand's beam at it. This looked like some kind of enchantment. He wondered whether he might be able to blast it out of the way. He waved his wand and conjured a gust of wind that cut right through the mist.
He was focusing his magic to see if he could sense what the mist was when he heard a blood curdling scream come from somewhere.
"Fleur?!" Harry yelled.
There was silence. He stared all around him. What had happened to her? Her scream seemed to have come from somewhere ahead. He pushed his magical senses out as far as he could, trying to find the French girl to no avail. He took a deep breath and ran through the enchanted mist, which he identified as an illusionary/compulsion charm though he didn't know to what effect.
The world turned upside down. Harry was hanging from the ground, with his hair on end, his glasses dangling off his nose, threatening to fall into the bottomless sky. He clutched them to the end of his nose and hung there, terrified. It felt as though his feet were glued to the grass, which had now become the ceiling. Below him the dark, star-spangled heavens stretched endlessly. He felt as though if he tried to move one of his feet, he would fall away from the earth completely.
Think, he told himself, as all the blood rushed to his head, clear your head. . .
Every fiber of his being told him he shouldn't move. He could hear the blood pounding in his ears. He had two choices - try and move anyways, or send up red sparks, and get rescued and disqualified from the task.
He shut his eyes, so he wouldn't be able to see the view of endless space below him and pulled his right foot as hard as he could away from the grassy ceiling.
Immediately, the world righted itself. Harry fell forward onto his knees onto the wonderfully solid ground. He felt temporarily limp with shock. He took a deep, steadying breath, then got up again and continued forward, looking back over his shoulder as he ran away from the golden mist, which twinkled innocently at him in the moonlight.
He paused at a junction of two paths and looked around for some sign of Fleur. He was sure it had been she who had screamed. What had she met? Was she all right? There was no sign of red sparks - did that mean she had got herself out of trouble, or was she in such trouble that she couldn't reach her wand? Harry took the right fork with a feeling of increasing unease. . . but at the same time, he couldn't help thinking. One champion down. . .
The cup was somewhere close by, and it sounded as though Fleur was no longer in the running. He'd got this far, hadn't he? What if he actually managed to win a tournament he hadn't even wanted to compete in? Hah- jokes on whatever bastard caused this mess. He quickly shoved those thoughts out of his mind; there was no way it would be so easy- things with Harry Potter were never easy.
He met nothing for ten more minutes but kept running into dead ends. Twice he took the same wrong turning. Finally, he found a new route and walked briskly along it, his wandlight waving, making his shadow flicker and distort on the hedge walls. Then he rounded another corner and found himself facing a Blast-Ended Skrewt.
Cedric was right - it was enormous. Ten feet long, it looked more like a giant scorpion than anything. Its long sting was curled over its back. Its thick armor glinted in the light from Harry's wand, which he pointed at it.
"Shit!" he blurted out as he jabbed his wand forward and shot a reducto.
The spell hit the skrewt's armor and rebounded; Harry ducked just in time, but could smell burning hair; it had singed the top of his head. The skrewt issued a blast of fire from its end and flew forward toward him.
He quickly cast a cutting curse; once more it hit the skrewt's armor and ricocheted off.
Harry backed off a few paces but the skrewt was gaining on him. It was barely a foot away and reared up to strike when he jabbed his wand forward again, this time with a piercing hex. He managed to hit it on its fleshy, shell-less underside this time and the spell did it's job, piercing through the flesh and stopping the creature in it's tracks.
Harry pushed himself away from it and ran, hard, in the opposite direction. He took a left path and hit a dead end, a right, and hit another; forcing himself to stop, heart hammering, he performed the Four-Point Spell again, backtracked, and chose a path that would take him northwest.
He had been hurrying along the new path for a few minutes, when he heard something in the path running parallel to his own that made him stop dead.
"What are you doing?" yelled Cedric's voice. "What the hell d'you think you're doing?"
And then Harry heard Krum's voice.
"Crucio!"
The air was suddenly full of Cedric's yells. Horrified, Harry began sprinting up his path, trying to find a way into Cedric's. When none appeared, he cast an overpowered bombarda at the wall. It wasn't as effective as he would have hoped, due to the the enchantments, but it made a hole just big enough for him to force his way through. He climbed out and looked to his right to see Cedric jerking and twitching on the ground, Krum standing over him.
Harry pulled himself up and pointed his wand at Krum just as Krum looked up. Krum turned and began to run.
Harry fired a very overpowered stupefy at him and the spell hit Krum in the back; he stopped dead in his tracks, fell forward, and lay motionless, facedown in the grass. Harry finished up with an incarcerous before dashing over to Cedric, who had stopped twitching and was lying there panting, his hands over his face.
"Are you all right?" Harry said roughly, grabbing Cedric's arm.
"Yeah," panted Cedric. "Yeah. . . I don't believe it. . . he crept up behind me. . . . I heard him, I turned around, and he had his wand on me. Fucking bastard."
Cedric got up. He was still shaking. He and Harry looked down at Krum.
"I can't believe this. . . I thought he was all right," Harry said, staring at Krum.
"So did I," said Cedric.
"Did you hear Fleur scream earlier?" said Harry.
"Yeah," said Cedric. "You don't think Krum got her too?"
"I don't know," said Harry slowly.
"Should we leave him here?" Cedric muttered.
"No," said Harry. "I reckon we should send up red sparks. Someone'll come and collect him. . . otherwise he'll probably be eaten by a skrewt. "
"He'd deserve it," Cedric muttered, but all the same, he raised his wand and shot a shower of red sparks into the air, which hovered high above Krum, marking the spot where he lay.
Harry and Cedric stood there in the darkness for a moment, looking around them. Then Cedric said, "Well… I s'pose we'd better go on…"
"What?" said Harry. "Oh. . . yeah. . . right. . . "
It was an odd moment. He and Cedric had been briefly united against Krum - now the fact that they were opponents came back to Harry. The two of them proceeded up the dark path, but not before Cedric delivered a swift kick right to Krums mouth. The pair moved for a moment without speaking, then Harry turned left, and Cedric right. Cedric's footsteps soon died away.
Harry moved on, continuing to use the Four-Point Spell, making sure he was moving in the right direction. It was between him and Cedric now. His desire to reach the cup first was now burning stronger than ever, but he could hardly believe what he'd just seen Krum do. The use of an Unforgivable Curse on a fellow human being meant a life term in Azkaban, that was what Moody had told them. Krum surely couldn't have wanted the Triwizard Cup that badly. Harry sped up his walk to a near jog, more glad than ever that his training with Moody had been so physical.
Every so often he hit more dead ends, but the increasing darkness made him feel sure he was getting near the heart of the maze. Then, as he strode down a long, straight path, he saw movement once again, and his beam of wandlight hit an extraordinary creature, one which he had only seen in picture form, in his Monster Book of Monsters.
It was a sphinx. It had the body of an overly-large lion: great clawed paws and a long yellowish tail ending in a brown tuft. Its head, however, was that of a woman. She turned her long, almond-shaped eyes upon Harry as he approached. He raised his wand, hesitating. She was not crouching as if to spring, but pacing from side to side of the path, blocking his progress. Then she spoke, in a deep, hoarse voice.
"You are very near your goal. The quickest way is past me. "
"So. . . so will you move, please?" said Harry, knowing what the answer was going to be.
"No," she said, continuing to pace. "Not unless you can answer my riddle. Answer on your first guess - I let you pass. Answer wrongly - I attack. Remain silent - I will let you walk away from me unscathed. "
Harry's expression soured. This was really more Hermione or even Daphne's area of expertise. He weighed his chances. If the riddle was too hard, he could keep silent, get away from the sphinx unharmed, and try and find an alternative route to the center.
"Okay," he said. "Can I hear the riddle?"
The sphinx sat down upon her hind legs, in the very middle of the path, and recited:
"First think of the person who lives in disguise,
Who deals in secrets and tells naught but lies.
Next, tell me what's always the last thing to mend,
The middle of middle and end of the end?
And finally give me the sound often heard
During the search for a hard-to-find word.
Now string them together, and answer me this,
Which creature would you be unwilling to kiss?"
Harry actually smiled. This seemed simple enough. He would owe Hermione and Daphne both a kiss when this was over, maybe even Tracey as well. He was glad that he had listened to his friends and actually worked on his intellect as well instead of just binge learning spells.
"A person in disguise," Harry muttered to himself, staring at her, "who tells only lie? That would be a spy."
"'The last thing to mend, Middle of Middle, and end of End… The letter D. So, Spy D.
"The sound often heard during the search for a hard-to-find word." said Harry. "Er... Oh shit that's it- Er. Spy-D-Er."
The sphinx smiled at him.
He smiled back at the creature. "I guess I certainly wouldn't want to kiss a spider." He shrugged at the thought of kissing Eragog, the acromantula from his second year. He then winced as the memory made him think of Ron. "Ron damn sure wouldn't kiss one of those abominations. He'd rather be dead." He mumbled to himself with a sad smile.
The sphinx smiled more broadly, though she remained quiet and still.
"Well? Sorry if I sound impatient but you see…" He said as he waved his hand around himself, gesturing towards the maze. It was then that he felt a sudden probe into his mind. He slammed his occlumency shield as strong as he could instantly but had no luck in stopping the probe.
"No worries, Harry Potter." He heard the Sphinx's voice inside his mind and relaxed a touch. He wasn't thrilled that the creature had invaded his mind freely but at least it wasn't a new threat. The other competitor is about to leave us." As soon as the sentence finished he noticed red sparks shoot up from a little way to his right.
"What?!" He exclaimed quickly in his mind. "Is Cedric okay?!"
"He is fine. He was running from an acromantula nest and got captured by devil's snare. The other wizards will get to him fine. That leaves only us. I was to be the last obstacle on this path. The other competitors have been eliminated; the veela is okay, by the way." She said before he even had a chance to ask.
"So if you are the last task and I'm the only one remaining, why delay it? Doesn't that mean I've won?"
"Indeed, you will be the Triwizard Champion, Harry Potter of the so-called Emrys academy."
"So-called?" He asked with a hint of confusion.
"There isn't, to my knowledge-and remember that I'm a sphinx- any such wizarding school."
That pretty much cleared things up. Sphinxes were known to be beings of near infinite wisdom, with a network of sorts connecting them to others of their kind and supposedly even to magic itself; if the sphinx didn't know of this school, then it didn't exist.
"Then why was I entered into the tournament as a student there?"
"It was to ensure you were selected. If you were entered as a student from a real school with other students, even though the goblet was charmed to select yours-the only entered name, it could have deemed you not worthy and overrode the selection by choosing another student at random, however unlikely that may be. The names entered were only for the goblet to consider, it would ultimately choose the most worthy student from each school that was entered."
"I see. Might you know who it was that entered my name, since you know everything that has been going on?"
"I do indeed."
There was an awkward pause for a moment as neither spoke before Harry continued. "Will you tell me?"
"I will not."
"Son of a bitch!"
"I'm sorry, Harry Potter, but it is not within my rights to disclose that information. Things are already set in motion that must continue. All I can say, and by hearing this you will be bound by oath to see this tournament to the end- there can be no turning back." She paused for a moment to give him time to object. When he didn't she continued. "While you have bested the tournament and will soon become the champion, you will still face much danger tonight. Not everyone is as they appear to be, though you have already came to this conclusion."
Harry's face fell at that. He knew it was too good to be true; he couldn't simply win the tournament and enjoy putting one back on the bastards for once.
"I'm sorry, Harry Potter. You have faced so much for one so young, with such a handicap no less."
Harry scrunched his face at that. "A handicap?"
"Ahh yes. Your oh-so-famous scar is more than it appears. It is a wound on not only the flesh but upon your very soul as well." At this Harry felt a… he wasn't sure what he would call it, actually; maybe a pressure would be the best term, inside his head before suddenly recalling an abundance of information about something called a horcrux.
"Weird. I know I've never even heard of a horcrux thingy before but know it seems like I know everything about them." Harry thought to himself.
"Weird, indeed." The sphinx's voice answered with what he assumed was mirth. He had forgot that the creature could sift through his head effortlessly. "I have imparted you with a bit of knowledge I feel you may find useful."
Harry's expression drew into a scowl. "So by mark upon my soul, you mean to tell me that my scar is a horcrux?"
"Technically, no." The sphinx replied. "It is a physical manifestation where the soul fragment is most concentrated, but the horcrux itself is actually tied into your mind, body, and soul."
"So how am I to get rid of it if it is tied so deeply to my being?" Harry asked.
"Worry not. When next you wake, the problem will have sorted itself out. Be aware that many facets of your life will be drastically different; your whole life you have subconsciously devoted a substantial portion of your magic and focus to suppressing this piece of Voldemort as it tried to consume you and take over your body. With the leech taken care of I feel that your magical core will grow exponentially. You may also awaken some dormant talents along with the newly found powers; it is hard to say for certain how you will react as I know of no other instance of a human being made into a horcrux."
"Encouraging." Harry mumbled out before raising his voice again. "Why would you tell me all of this?"
"Fate works in mysterious ways, Harry Potter; do not question the whys or hows. Your destiny is that of greatness; filled with many trials and much trouble, but it is prophesized that you will be great. This is all that I can say of the matter. Go now, claim your victory, and may the odds be ever in your favor."
"Thank you… I never got your name actually."
"I am Persephone."
"Thank you, Persephone. I hope that one day our paths may cross again."
"Indeed, Harry Potter." Persephone began and paused. "A parting gift for you, ordained by my Queen."
Before Harry even had a chance to ask what the gift would be he felt a stab of pain behind his eyes so intense it brought him to his knees with a grunt. He slapped his hands over his eyes to prevent what he thought would be them popping out of his head. "What the hell?!" He finally moaned out.
After receiving no reply he gingerly opened his eyes to find the sphinx gone, nothing blocking his path to the cup he could see illuminated just a few meters away.
Harry made with way down the final stretch of the maze. Any happy thoughts he might have had of winning the tournament were squashed as he recalled what Persephone had said. He still faced much danger tonight. Shit.
Finally he was standing directly beside the cup, close enough to reach out and grab it. He could sense the magic radiating off of the artifact and identified it as a portkey almost immediately. "Didn't think I'd ever seen a portkey before either. Maybe Persephone left me that bit of knowledge as well" He thought.
With a sigh, he reached to his belt and pulled back a small vial which quickly grew to regular size. Another thing he had to thank Moody for. Demanding that he always carry, at minimum, pepper up potion, poison antidote, blood replenisher, and numbing potions.
He downed the pepper up potion in one gulp and shuddered as steam blew from his ears and his face turned red. As the initial effects died down he took a deep breath, tightened his grip on his wand, and grabbed the cup. Instantly, Harry felt a jerk somewhere behind his navel. His feet had left the ground. He could not unclench the hand holding the Triwizard Cup; it was pulling him onward in a howl of wind and swirling color.
And there you have it. For those that have asked, this is the point where things begin to diverge from canon in a hurry. Yea, I'm using the sphinx and that whole magic growing and dormant power thing as an asspull to boost Harry's power, but as the title hints at, some of these folks have to become gods.