Kindred Spirits

by Tailkinker

This is a work of fan fiction based on the Harry Potter series and the Sailor Moon franchise created respectively by J.K. Rowling and Naoko Takeuchi. The characters and settings belong to their respective owners and no copyright infringement is intended. This story is written purely for entertainment purposes and should not be considered as part of the official canon of either series.

The Fourth Task

"Meiou-sensei said to stay close to you," said Harry quietly. "But I'll be going in a minute and a half before you. Should I just wait near the entrance?"

"No," said Ami. "Just do what you normally would. I trust Setsuna to make things happen the way they should."

"Wish I had your confidence in her," muttered Harry. To be fair, the Divinations Professor, or Soldier, or whatever she was...she did seem to be on the side of angels. But she was very secretive, and that made her hard to trust.

The whistle blew, and Cedric, who was leading in points, charged into the maze. Harry braced himself; he was only three points behind Cedric, and that meant he'd be going in only thirty seconds behind him—

The whistle blew again, and Harry ran towards the entrance. He saw Cedric take a left up ahead of him, and so promptly took his first right. Basic rule for solving a maze, he mused. Pick a direction, and keep turning that way.

Of course, that presupposed that the maze wasn't filled with monsters and magical traps, nor that the hedges themselves wouldn't try to eat you. But despite his competitive nature and his ever-present desire to win, his best goal was to try to ensure his survival, not his victory.

The passage turned three more times, with no branches, and Harry was now fairly disoriented. He balanced his wand on the palm of his left hand and said, "Point Me." Hermione had discovered the Four Corners spell in an odd spellbook left on a "damaged and unrepairable" cart in the library. His wand spun in his palm, and came to rest pointing towards the north.

"So I've been turned around somewhat," he mumbled. He knew that the cup was to the east of his starting position. But there had not yet been another branch; he had no choice but to continue along this passage.

There was a rustling sound behind him. He tried to turn, and stumbled—something had ahold of his ankle! He glanced down, and saw that a thick, flexible vine had crawled across the ground and wrapped itself around his foot. The vine was covered in some sticky material that clung to the fabric of his jeans.

"Now, that's not fair," he grumbled. "You're meant to stay in the hedge. Diffindo!"

With a flash of bright light, the cutting curse made short work of the vine, and he stumbled away, only to see more vines snaking towards him. "Diffindo! Diffindo!" He backed further down the passage, and the vines failed to pursue him.

"Good," he panted. "They've got a limited reach."

He heard the whistle blow again, and knew that Ami was now entering the maze. He turned, and saw that the passage came to a T, going left and right. He cast the Four Corners spell again, and was dismayed to see the wand swinging to the left.

"No," he muttered. "Keep to the rule."

With some trepidation, he turned and headed down the right-hand passage. The setting sun behind him cast long shadows against the ground and hedges. The passage turned to the left, but just as he rounded the corner, he heard a rustling behind him. He turned, wand out, to see that the passage had closed up behind him.

The hedges change, he realized angrily. No rule will help me solve this maze. I shoulda turned left!

Well, there was nothing for it now; he was left with only one course open to him. He turned back, and continued down the passage.

The shadows had grown darker in only a few seconds. He frowned; the maze was illuminated from above—part of the reason that they chose to use the Quidditch pitch was to allow a cable to be strung between the two highest goal hoops, to suspend a light source. But in this part of Scotland, which was more mountainous than both, surely the sun would have set by now. Once more, he cast the Four-Point spell, and noted that he was currently facing to the south.

But that would mean that the sun wouldn't be over my shoulder, he realized. He scowled, and aimed his wand at the shadows.

One of the shadows moved towards him.

He immediately fired an Incendio at it, but the bolt of flame flew through the shadow without impacting it. The shadow appeared to come right off the ground, its cloak-like form fluttering, and threw itself at him. He dove to the side, barely avoiding its pounce.

He remembered reading something about this in Fantastic Beasts, and wracked his brain for the details. With his heart thumping in his chest, it was hard to concentrate, but he had it: a Lethifold. More or less insubstantial, they turned solid when attacking to try to suffocate their prey. He grinned tightly; luckily, their greatest weakness was one of his strengths.

"Expecto Patronum!"

Prongs charged forward, smashing into the Lethifold and driving it back. With an unearthly wail, it fled through the hedge walls.

Good riddance, he thought. He considered dismissing Prongs, but decided to keep him around for a minute or two, just in case the Lethifold tried to return.

The maze passage continued, the turned sharply into a four-way junction. This time, the Point Me spell indicated that he was already travelling east. He walked straight through the junction, pausing only to look down both the left and right passages briefly.

No need to let myself be flanked, he mused.

There was a sudden, short scream from his left. He whirled about, a Stunner already glowing on his wand-tip, but all he could see was hedges. Then above the hedges, green sparks rose.

Someone's out, he thought. I think that was Fleur.

Regardless, he had to continue. He moved down the passage once more. It wasn't long until he saw someone approaching from ahead. He grinned as he recognized her.

"Ami!"

"There you are." Ami grinned at him. "Have you had much trouble?"

"Not really," said Harry. "I think that any other person my age might have, however. But the hardest thing I've run into was tailor-made for me to beat it."

"Odd," said Ami. "I've had to fight off...I don't know the English for them. A shape-changing fear monster."

"Boggart."

"Ah. Thank you. Also a giant spider, and one of those...things...Professor Hagrid was raising." She shuddered. "And a ghost."

"The ghost was probably just an observer," said Harry. "Who screamed?"

"I don't know," she admitted. "It sounded female, so probably Delacour."

"If you're coming from this direction," said Harry, "then I'm going the wrong direction."

"I've been using the right-hand rule."

"So was I," said Harry. "But that won't work here, because the maze changes."

"Well, that's cheating!" huffed Ami, and Harry grinned.

"You are so much like Hermione," he said.

"So which way?"

"We'll go back this way—" he indicated the direction from which he had come. "Then we'll take a left. I'm pretty sure that the right-hand turn will put us back towards the edge of the maze."

"Lead on," she said.

They made their way back to the junction, which Harry was concerned to see was no longer a four-way junction. The passage directly across from them, from which Harry had entered, was closed off.

"Yeah, this isn't the same," he muttered. "But we can still take a left here."

"Crucio!"

The incantation was in a hoarse voice, and the sound of screaming pulled Harry into a run. He charged down the passage, wand extended, and came into a clearing.

Viktor Krum had Cedric under his wand.

"Expelliarmus!"

Viktor's wand flew from his grasp, and he turned. Harry was shocked to see the boy's face—it was completely devoid of expression, and his eyes looked glazed over. The Bulgarian charged towards Harry, and he snapped his wand forward again.

"Stupefy!"

The stunner hit the other Seeker, halting his charge, but still his expression did not change. Harry hit him with another stunner, and Krum dropped to the ground.

Ami was kneeling next to Cedric. "He's passed out. What spell was Krum using on him?"

"Torture curse," said Harry. "It's incredibly illegal—you get sent to prison for life for using it."

"Why would he do that?"

"I think he was under the Imperius curse." Harry glanced back at Viktor. "He's not the kind of guy who would do something like this normally. And his expression was completely blank."

"What do we do with Cedric?" asked Ami.

Harry picked up Viktor's wand, and shot green sparks into the air. Then tucked the wand into his belt, under his shirt. If Viktor woke up, he didn't want him to have access to his wand.

"Come on," he said. "These two will be rescued shortly."

They exited the clearing through a passage on the far side. This time, Ami took the lead, her wand held out in front of her.

"So what are you really after here?" asked Harry. "You and the other Soldiers, that is. You sure didn't come here for this Tournament."

He'd heard some of it from Setsuna, but he wanted to see how honest Ami would be with him.

"We're looking for one of our enemies," said Ami. "She defeated us—she killed us, in fact. But Sailor Moon drove her off, and brought us back."

"Which one is Moon?" asked Harry.

"She didn't come with us," said Ami. "She had to stay in Tokyo. We actually feel a bit lost without her here."

"Must be the Heart," mused Harry, thinking of Hotaru's description of the typical sentai team. "Can she bring anybody back from the dead, or just you guys?"

"Nobody really knows how powerful she is," admitted Ami. "Herself least of all; she thinks she's the weakest of all of us."

"Seems to be a common theme," he said. "What's that up ahead?"

"A clearing. Is that the Cup?"

It was, in fact, the Tri-Wizard Cup. Despite the change of name to the International Challenge, it seemed that the Ministry of Magic hadn't bothered renaming the Cup. It sat on a pedestal in the center of the clearing.

Harry noted some rubble lying nearby, and knelt to examine it.

"This looks like it was a statue," he said. "I see a head and a hand."

"Why would this be here?" Ami pulled out her computer, and tapped its keyboard. "The stone is charmed to move...It may have been a golem."

"Probably the last challenge for the Cup," said Harry. "Why would someone destroy the golem, but not take the Cup?"

Ami pocketed the computer, and pulled out her wand. "Something's not right here."

"Yeah," said Harry. "I've barely encountered any real threats, and someone was controlling Krum." He stood up again, and pulled out his own wand. "I think that someone's trying to ensure I win this. It's the only reason I can think of for it being this easy, and for Krum being forced to attack Diggory. But I don't think they planned on you being here."

"How do we spring the trap?" asked Ami.

"I think it's the Cup," said Harry. "Bagman said it was a portkey, to take us to the podium. If someone's hijacked that portkey, it could take us anywhere."

"Then let's take it."

To his shock, Ami reached for the cup.

"No!"

He dove forward, trying to stop her, but the result was that both of them touched it at the same time.

And with the feeling of a hook behind his navel, he was whisked into the vortex.