Author's Note: In chapter 11, Harry has to get the scoop on what happened while he was battling Voldemort and then in Saint Mungo's. This was always a tricky part of the storyline to resolve, because I set my POV characters (Taylor, Harry, Sirius) and decided to stick to them for consistency of format, tone, and focus on the relevant plotline. But… none of them were there for some pretty interesting events. The solution was to have the events conveyed in past-tense by Harry's friends, and while I think that worked nicely for the Fudge confrontation, it didn't serve Fleur and the end of the Triwizard Tournament quite so well, especially in the published second draft. And in chapter 12, Fleur gets not a single mention, beyond that we know she isn't with Bill Weasley. Whoops!

Here's an addition to the 'Harry catches up' scene in chapter eleven that does Fleur a bit more justice. Everything up to the beginning of this remains as it is

"That settles it," Harry declared. "When we graduate, we're taking over the Ministry." The stupid cover-up with Barty, the cover-up with the hostages being sabotaged, and now this… He didn't really want to go into government, but it was obviously in need of serious adjustment. He wanted to be able to mostly ignore the government, confident that they weren't massively mucking up easy, obvious things like investigating serious crimes. Apparently that was not a given.

"Can we just blow it up instead?" Ginny asked darkly.

"If we evacuate the people first," Neville offered. "I don't know, Harry, I don't want to be a parchment-pusher, even an important one."

"How about we install like-minded leaders who reflect our values?" Luna proposed. "That way we do not have to do any of the work ourselves."

They all looked at Luna.

"I think Susan Bones wants to go into government," Harry recalled.

"Percy will fight her for the position of Minister," Ginny said. "If we can just beat some sense into him first, he might stand a chance of winning."

"Ron might make a good Chief Auror, we could trust him not to take bribes from the Malfoys," Neville suggested.

"It's a start. What we really need to do is get rid of Fudge, though." They were talking long-term plans, but right at this moment the Minister was a blithering idiot.

"That will happen on its own," Luna assured him. "Fudge is digging a hole."

"Harry, did you see this yet?" Neville reached down to pull something out of his bag. "The twins are selling them."

"Oh, yes, you got one?" Ginny asked. "They told me they were sold out."

"What is it?" Harry looked at the roll of parchment Neville set on the table.

"A transcription of Fleur's acceptance speech, with a voice charm that reads it in her voice," Ginny explained. "Just listen."

Neville tapped the parchment with his wand and it sprang up into the air, unraveling. On one side, the side facing Harry, a line sketch of Fleur glared over at something out of sight as she stalked onto what he recognized as the little platform Fudge had set up outside of the maze. There were few details, but even as an outline she looked beautiful, if not slightly inhuman with feathers running down the back of her neck. A much less flattering illustration of Fudge held out a trophy to her, along with a sack of something. She took both, then turned to face out.

"I would like to say… a few words." The charm sounded just like her, accent and all, though she sounded like she was carefully choosing every word to avoid misspeaking. "As a Champion, that is my right. I won today…"

There was a pause. Luna smiled serenely as everyone else leaned in to better hear her.

"Through luck and spite," Fleur continued harshly. The illustration of her shook her head and glared out of the paper. "Nothing more. Certainly not through extraordinary skill. I entered the maze last, and I only won because my rivals were busy cursing each other. We were the only actual challenges in the maze, everything else was trivial or worthless except as a spectacle, much like this whole Tournament."

"Hold on–!" Fudge's voice was much less realistic.

The illustration of Fleur shoved him aside when he tried to interject. "Non! It was a disappointment! The tasks were badly designed, badly implemented, and uninteresting! All three tested my knowledge of beasts and of curses, nothing more. The judging was unfair, the first two tasks were mostly worthless in determining the final winner, there were completely unnecessary months between each task, nothing was planned to allow the audience to watch two of the three tasks, and you," the illustration of Fleur dropped the trophy to point at Fudge, "covered up an attempted murder! Do not think I will hold my tongue! I am not your crooked Ministry or whipped press! Someone tried to have my sister drown in your lake, and I will have justice!"

"See here," Fudge objected. "The Ministry admits to no–"

"I do not care!" Fleur cut him off. "Speaking as the winner of this empty excuse for spectacle, this was a disappointment from start to finish and you are responsible. You may keep your worthless cup, but I will take the prize money as recompense for this waste of a year of my life." She kicked the cup, her shoe hooking under the rim to fling it up at an angle. Right into the illustrated Fudge's crotch. He staggered back and fell off the stage even as Fleur descended, her back to him. "You will be hearing from my government and my lawyers!"

Harry watched the blobby outline of Fudge roll around on the stage for a bit after Fleur left the picture. "How much of this actually happened?" he asked.

"This is a modified wizarding picture," Neville said, with a huge grin. "And that speech is word for word."

In that case… "I guess we don't need to deal with Fudge," Harry conceded. He was well on his way to self-destructing on his own. Fleur and the French would probably finish him off, politically. From there, well, Harry assumed Fudge had enemies in Britain who would jump at the chance to get rid of him. Someone as obnoxious as Fudge had to have enemies. "These are sold out, you say?"

"They didn't even save any to sell to their siblings," Ginny grumped. "How did you score one, Neville?"

"Lee Jordan has a few he's holding for resale," Neville confessed. "You have to be in the Gryffindor boy's dorm to get to him."

"I'm getting one for Hermione," Ginny declared. "She'll like the enchanting work. I can give it to her when she gets back."

Harry thought about the timeline. "That will be in… four days, right?"

"Or less." Ginny cracked her knuckles. "We think. If not… You still have that invisibility cloak?"

"Yeah." He had a feeling he knew what they were going to be doing for the next four days. Planning a precautionary breakout. "And even if not… Who fancies helping me go visit my mum in Saint Mungo's? Nobody knows I have any reason to go, so they won't let me take off school if I ask." Or maybe they would. But he was feeling rebellious, and sneaking to Saint Mungo's couldn't be any harder than sneaking a trip home.

Author's Note: And as for what happens to Fleur in the long run? Unlike the whole 'give speech, insult Fudge' bit, I didn't have a plan or even an outline for that. Her character wasn't originally intended to even have a speaking role in this story, equal to Krum in background status. But now, looking at what she did and where she was in the story… If / when I make this scene part of the canon story, I'll also drop in a line or two somewhere in chapter 12 explaining what Fleur is up to post-timeskip. I like the idea of her and Taylor keeping up a correspondence after Taylor had cause to contact her for library reasons, but I still don't know what she's actually doing with her life, given the butterflies in her experiences and character. She has money, she has some fame, she has an abiding disgust for the Fudge administration and Britain as a whole, and a minor appreciation for Taylor… and without Voldemort or the Order, she knows nothing of Weasleys. That's it.

Feel free to toss in suggestions for this AU's Fleur in the comments.