The roar and commotion of the crowd had become slightly muffled due to the tent that the competitors waited in. The tent was large with a rounded table in the middle with plenty of chairs to choose from. There hadn't been any attachments of other rooms and each of the three competitors readied in their own way.
Delacour sat in one of the provided chairs, legs crossed and fingers drumming against the table. Her hair had been braided and she wore light blue robes that seemed a bit too light to have many heavy enchantments on them.
Krum paced. His feet nearly tangling and sending him tumbling a few times. The man's wand kept falling into his hand and back into the wrist holder with flicks of the man's wrist. He wore heavier material and Godric could sense the protections coming from it.
Godric stood in the far corner of the room where he could keep the two in his sights along with the tent flap. He had sent up a small bit of protection magic behind him so no one could enter by cutting through the material and getting to him from behind.
He twisted the ring around his finger, sending his thoughts to the others and no one telling him to stop.
Del not prepared.
Clothes too light.
Few if any protections.
Will probably burn.
Unless strong magically.
Doubtful.
Krum better prepared.
Clothes with protection.
Klutz on his feet.
Krum glanced over at Godric, eyes narrowed and seeming to take in his relaxed state he finally broke the silence, "You don't worry."
"Should I?"
The Durmstrang student looked at him and asked quietly, "You know the task?"
Interesting.
"If she," Delacour's voice cut in, stressing the word and glaring at Godric, "does not know, then she will be out of the competition faster. She is no threat."
Less interesting, though Delacour's hands shook.
Del is scared.
Might get hurt.
Godric went to say something, but Bagman entered the tent with a bounce in his step… and Skeeter followed behind him. The woman gave a smile to Godric and he returned one in kind, though his probably looked a bit more feral, judging from the small step she took backwards.
"Hello, Champions!"
Not champions, yet, but Godric didn't bother correcting the man. He would not listen and Godric didn't want to waste his breath on the man.
Bagman held up a small pouch that writhed from the inside, small snorts could be heard. "The First Task will be…" he paused for added flair and Skeeter grinned, floating quill and parchment at the ready. Krum's attention shifted from Bagman to Godric to Delacour who had stood to see the pouch closer. "… Dragons!" None of the three reacted as Bagman expected and Godric watched as the man seemed to deflate.
When the silence stretched on Godric finally asked from his position in the corner, "And? What are we to do with the dragons?"
"Ah, right!" Bagman perked up. "You will each be facing a dragon, a nesting mother to be precise."
Proctors are idiots.
Nesting mothers.
"In their nests are their eggs along with your goal: a golden egg. You must retrieve it from the nest the dragon is guarding. The way your score works is that each judge will award you up to ten points. You earn points by a cumulation of things: how quickly you can get the egg, the absence of injury to yourself, the dragon, and her clutch of eggs, along with the amount of time it takes you to leave the arena floor."
Godric stared at Bagman. Surely the task couldn't be so simple.
"To decide the order of which you will be facing your dragons, inside this bag there are four dragons to choose from with a number around their neck. As Mr. Potter is no longer competing, whoever draws the lowest number will be going first."
Well, Godric hadn't actually faced a dragon before, but he had heard stories and read up on them earlier.
"The dragon will represent what you will be going up against and in what order."
Strengths: magic resistant scales, sharp teeth and talons, large size, flies, some can sense magic, and some have different kinds of breath attacks such as fire or ice.
"Mr. Krum, if you will."
Weaknesses: eyes, underbelly, wing, slow to start, and can't use magic.
"The Chinese Fireball likes to spit fire for no reason at all. Third. Good, good. Miss Delacour, your turn."
First plan: summon the golden egg.
Second plan: Make visual copies of himself and scatter.
Third plan: Knock the dragon over backwards so as not to land on her clutch.
Fourth plan: Process more when faced with the actual dragon, might not be needed.
"The Welsh Green. Second." Bagman paused, coughed and said, "Err… Miss Dunbar?"
Godric rolled his eyes and stepped forward, looking at the miniature dragons that Krum and Delacour held in their hands with a mixture of disturbance and unease.
"I understand your confusion, but you may call me Ric."
"Right." He held the bag out. "Your turn."
The sound of a quill scratching along parchment had Godric taking a steadying breath. He carefully reached inside, being sure to coat his fingers in a protective layer of magic. A smile spread across his face as he felt one that immediately bit down on his finger. The second one shrank away, breathing fire.
Moving around gently, Godric scooped up the second one and brought it out. The scales were obsidian, the body long and lithe like a lizard. Yellow eyes stared back, vertical pupils keen and sharp. Bronze horns curved from it's head with same colored spikes adorning it from tip to tail. Around its neck hung a simple cord with the number four dangling from it.
"The Hungarian Horntail and you'll be last in the arena."
Godric didn't look up from the tiny dragon which was staring up at him. It opened its mouth and gave out a yowling screech before curling up into a ball and covering its face with a wing. He chuckled and carefully tucked the creature into his pocket, placing a protective bubble around it. After a moment's thought he placed a silencing spell around it as well so it wouldn't hear anything going on. And then he added yet one more so the creature wouldn't get too disturbed if he had to move quickly.
"When you hear the gong, that means that the champion before you has completed their task, the dragons have been switched out, and the next champion can come out. Miss Delacour, as you are first, when the gong sounds, please leave through that exit," he pointed to the far side of the tent… where nothing happened.
Bagman frowned.
Godric carefully, slowly lowered his wards, and finally another entrance appeared.
"Ah, there it is! I thought I timed that right. Anyway, you will leave through there and the First Task will begin! I need to be off to get in place, I'm one of the judge's, you know!" He scurried off and Godric went back to the corner he had first taken up, keeping his attention on the exits around him.
Skeeter went towards Delacour first, probably as she had the least amount of time with the Beauxbatons student. He sent some more messages out with short pauses in between to give the others some time to read them.
Sal - Understand dragons?
Are they like snakes?
Well
Transfigured dragons?
For the first time since he entered the tent and began sending random messages to the others, the ring warmed in response and he brought his hand to his face, acting as if he were simply checking his fingers.
Doubtful.
A few seconds later, his finger warmed again and the word morphed away to show new ones.
Why do you have one?
Godric snorted and sent back a succinct answer: Bagman.
Skeeter moved on to Krum as the gong went off. Delacour looked pale and she visibly began to tremble, but she threw her braided, silvery hair over her shoulder and strode out. The cheers of the students echoed around inside the tent before silencing once more when the flap closed behind her.
"Miss Dunbar," the voice of Skeeter came as no surprise to Godric. She had finished whatever conversation she had with Krum and had decided to move on to Godric. Great.
He sighed. "Not Miss, but if that's too odd, just Ric is fine, Miss Skeeter."
"So, what the students have been saying about you is true then? You think you were born in the wrong body."
"The body isn't wrong, the bits are."
She blinked, looked confused, but moved on, "So, are you interested in dating girls?"
"No."
A brief moment of pause. "Boys?"
"No."
That threw her for a loop, and Godric had to bite back a laugh. "Neither?"
"I didn't say that."
"You said you aren't interested in either gender."
"I know what I said. And I haven't lied."
Skeeter frowned. "How do you feel about being the youngest champion?"
"Fine."
Scritch, scritch, scritch .
Godric glanced over at the quill and watched as it moved at a much more rapid pace than it should have considering how short his answers had been the whole time they were conversing.
"And you aren't concerned that there are more experienced Champions, meaning you will most likely lose this tournament?"
"I have no intention of losing, Miss Skeeter."
Scritch, scritch, scritch.
"And what makes you say that?"
Godric narrowed his eyes. "I wouldn't have put my name in the goblet if I knew I'd lose."
"So you think you can win?"
Scritch, scritch, scritch.
The quill moved faster, and Godric waited to see when it would stop. After thirty seconds, ample enough time, it still wrote.
"Everyone who puts their name in believes so."
"Including you."
The gong sounded and Krum left, leaving for his turn in the arena. It seemed as if thirty minutes had passed.
Godric waited until the rush of sound quieted once more before he answered, "No, Miss Skeeter. I don't think I will win."
"Is that why you forced Harry to drop out of the competition?"
"Beg your pardon?" His voice dropped and his words came out precisely. His fingers itched for his sword; fortunately for the witch, he had left his weapon in the laboratory.
"He was to be Hogwarts second Champion and you didn't even give him a chance to prove himself. Instead you came up with a way to get him out of the tournament."
"Of course I did. Did you forget that he did not put his name into the goblet? I'm sure if you go back a few weeks in your own newspaper you would see the articles. It was covered."
Scritch scritch scritch.
"He could still compete if he wanted to. If you can, so can he."
"If he passed the Age Line and he wanted to compete, yes."
"And you're sure he didn't want to?"
Scritch, scritch, scritch.
Godric's short temper came close to the tipping point, but he held onto it.
Barely.
Scritch, scritch, scritch.
How long had it been since Krum went out?
"Yes."
If there were any times he could channel the other three, it would have been at that moment.
Skeeter hummed and tapped a painted fingernail against her chin. "It seems to me that you're doing this for the attention, the glory. What do you say to that?"
Godric closed his eyes.
Scritch, scritch, scritch.
Patience. He had to have patience. He could handle her. If he said nothing, she couldn't print anything.
"Is it because you're much younger than the others?"
Scritch, scritch, scritch.
Godric took a steadying breath.
"I believe we are done talking, Miss Skeeter."
Scritch, scritch, scritch.
"Ooooh, am I hitting a little too close to the truth? You can tell me."
He pressed his finger over the ring.
Egg caught yet?
"That's a pretty little ring."
He covered his hand over it, hiding it from her eyes and made his way to the corner nearest the exit. When he made it to the exit, he felt the ring warm and he quickly took a look.
Not yet.
Scritch, scritch, scritch.
How he wanted to destroy the quill. The blasted thing grated on his nerves.
"Did Harry give it to you?"
"Miss Skeeter, if you don't mind, I would like to prepare in silence."
"Do you have a plan?"
Scritch, scritch, scritch.
She followed him and was standing over his shoulder.
He hated being so short.
Scritch, scritch, scritch.
Not as much as he hated that quill.
"What are your plans for the rest of the tournament? Providing the dragon doesn't kill you."
Godric went to the table in the middle of the room and he felt his ring heat up, but he didn't dare look as long as Skeeter was in the room with him.
"Miss Skeeter -"
"Why did you decide to take the position of champion instead of letting someone more deserving have it?"
Scritch, scritch, scritch.
His temper snapped.
Godric whipped out his wand and pointed it at Skeeter. She took a step back but Godric stepped closer to the woman while glaring at her.
"Oh ho, I seem to have hit a nerve."
Scritch, scritch, scr-
Godric jabbed his wand at the parchment and quill, the two items went up in flames seconds later. Skeeter screeched at the sight - almost in time with the gong. He looked at the gobsmacked woman and said, "I never agreed to an interview, Miss Skeeter."
He turned on his heel and stormed out of the tent. He didn't bother to silence his footsteps. He didn't bother holstering his wand.
The screams and cheers echoed around him as he simply strode into the rocky arena, gravel snapping under foot.
Stands soared up on all sides, students of all houses and schools mixed and mingled. The judges sat on a large platform, overlooking the arena. A low, rumbling yowl to his left had him turning to look at the dragon - a perfect life-size replica of the miniature in his pocket - about twenty meters away. She was larger than Ismanna, as the adult dragon was roughly about fourteen meters long.
She stood guard over her clutch of eggs, nearly resting on top of them.
Godric flicked his wand and set a barrier around the eggs on the off chance the dragon moved or became too agitated to remember where her clutch was, the eggs would be protected. He watched detachedly as her maw opened, showing off rows and rows of teeth, and tongues of fire licked around her jaws as yellow eyes locked on his.
Godric stayed still, head tilting as he studied the agitated dragon before him. Talons ripped into the earth as she clawed and gripped, rocks crumbling in her grasp. A barbed tail scourged the ground as it raked back and forth.
Chains kept her to the ground and his eyes narrowed at how they strained against her frantic movements. Her head whipped around, trying to keep an eye on all the humans and Godric at the same time. She screeched intermittently in warning.
Godric's anger from Skeeter's nettling lay heavily around him like his cloak, close and fitting. His magic whipped around him as he held it harshly under control. He stalked towards the dragon, wand pointing to the side and ready to cast.
The mother kept him in her sights the whole time, watching, waiting. When she deemed him close enough - just shy of fourteen meters - she parted her maw, a stream of flames heading straight for Godric.
The screams from the stands barely registered.
Too young.
Not knowledgeable enough.
Not strong enough.
The options he had given himself flew out of his head.
He would get the egg facing the dragon head on.
He snarled, and spun on his foot, wand twirling in the air as he took control of the fire racing towards him. Magical fire was difficult to control, especially if it hadn't been conjured by the wizard trying to bend it to his will. The fire Godric faced wasn't magical, even though it came from a magical being.
So he twirled, light on his feet as he pulled the fire into a ring of red and orange and heat and light around him. Sweat ran down his neck, his back, and clung to his skin as he danced with danger.
His heart rate pulsed heavily in his throat and slowly, slowly the anger ebbed. Planting himself, he sent the fire outwards towards the stones and boulders littered about the arena, the rocks turning a blinding red and white.
Godric couldn't hear over the roaring in his ears and the dragon's yowl of anger so he didn't know how the stadium's occupants were reacting. Didn't really care as he walked forwards towards the crouched dragon, whose wings were spread up and out, making her look bigger. Teeth bared to show they were the same length as Godric's body, thick saliva dribbling and bubbling to the earth.
In the nest, cradled between her two forelegs, rested her cement colored eggs and the glint of the golden egg. She strained against her bounds and Godric heard the screech of metal bending, pulling, snapping.
One side of the bindings that held her broke and she lunged forward, a back leg crashing down against the barrier he had set up to protect the eggs. Her neck stretched out, jaw reaching out to snap at Godric. She shot another stream of fire at him, but Godric flicked it to the side.
He gave a sigh, and with another snap of his wand he transfigured the chains that once bound her to wrap back around her and drag her back where she had been. A screech echoed around her, teeth snapping over and over in Godric's direction as she was pulled backwards, muscles straining to keep her in place and failing. Her talons scraped against the barrier, the eggs safely encased inside.
He imagined the fight with her unbound and knew he would have been hard pressed to win against her in that case. Especially without his weapon.
It would have been a fight he looked forward to, but she was simply protecting her eggs and he had the children to think of. He pointed his wand at the target and intoned, "Accio golden egg."
He watched dejectedly as the egg slipped from the safety of the nest and soared into his waiting palms.
The Hungarian Horntail rose onto her back legs, wings spread, head tilted back to roar her displeasure. Her body blocked the sun, casting shadows over the arena. The chains strained, but kept her in place. Her wings beat and she shot fire out at him, a torrent of wind screamed towards him, flames roaring brighter, faster, hotter - too fast for him to control well.
Godric's eyes widened. He jumped as high up as he could, pressed the egg against his stomach, and pulled his knees in to wrap himself around the egg to keep both hands free. As he fell back to the earth, he pointed his hand downwards and called forth wind to push him up, up, up - still not high enough to escape the fire - and his wand pointed in front of him, throwing wind away from him to push him backwards - towards the wall with the tunnel he needed to get to.
He laughed as he went careening backwards. The fire from the dragon rushed by in front of him and tapering off before the wind slammed into a nearby rock, pushing the boulder backwards with a resounding crash into the wall.
The dragon landed and screeched: high, loud, and piercing. Her attention turned once more unto Godric and he quickly stopped the wind. He fell six meters to the ground, throwing out a cushioning charm in time as he slammed to the earth, rolling to his feet with a grunt of pain. There, less than a meter away, was the tunnel and he made his way to it and inside.
Madame Pomfrey had not been impressed with his antics.
Though she did declare him fit enough to receive his marks from the judges after she fixed his sprain and the dragon was returned to her cage.
After a few minutes, a stocky man - with wild red hair and a nasty burn scar on one of his arms - came in and told Godric he was fine to go back out.
When Godric did, it was to the sound of the entire stadium roaring with applause and cheers. He blinked and sketched a quick bow before moving to stand in front of the raised platform the judges sat on with Percy Weasley standing behind Crouch, parchment and quill in hand.
Bagman stood, cast a spell so his voice echoed around the stadium, "You will be judged by the five of us and the most you can receive from one judge is ten points. Let's begin!"
They each raised their wands and shot a silver number into the air in the order of: Crouch, Bagman, Dumbledore, Karkaroff, and Maxime.
8
9
8
5
9
- - - - Founders - - - -
"... and enable you to prepare for it. All clear? Su-"
"Fay Richele Dunbar!"
Godric hadn't really been paying attention to what had been going on in the tent after the scores had been told or what the next phase of the competition was. He heard that the egg itself was the next clue, but he had tuned out shortly after that.
He really should have been paying attention as he hadn't even realized that the tent flap opened and people had made their way inside, a petite woman leading the way. Godric didn't have eyes for the others behind her.
She had tear stains on her cheeks, but her snapping blue eyes held a wreath of anger, confusion, and fear. The woman and Godric were nearly exact replicas of each other except the woman's long, chestnut colored hair lay braided and she wore a flowing dress that Godric would never wear.
"Hello, Mum."
Danielle Dunbar - who was called Dani by her friends - did not falter in her angry procession forward, Bagman hurried to the side in the midst of his explanation to make room for the angry woman.
"No, you do not 'Hello, Mum' me. I know you told me that you joined this competition, but I had no idea that you had to go up against dragons."
Any elation Godric had felt, dwindled and he took a hesitant step forward. His chest constricted at the terror written so clearly in Dani's face as she stood a few steps in front of him, trembling.
"Michael had been kind enough to pick me up so I could attend this task." Godric watched the fine trembles rake through her frame as her frantic eyes swept up and down his body, assessing any damage. "I did not put you through dance class for you to dance with fire!"
He forgot, quite often after he turned eleven, that he had a concerned mother. In his first life his parents had no magical abilities. They had been frightened for him... of him. They left him to be raised by the Sltytherins.
He shook his head and focused on his mother in front of him. Even though she had been born non magical, there wasn't such a harsh divide between them and the parents of magical children. The non magical parents were - not quite welcomed, but - tolerated.
Godric walked forward the rest of the way and carefully wrapped his arms around her waist, hating that his height fell below hers and he could not simply wrap her up. Dani took a shuddering breath and dropped her forehead to rest on top of Godric's head. Godric had to bite back his own tears when he felt his hair start to dampen.
"I can't lose you too, Ric," Dani whispered, brokenly, as her arms came up and wrapped Godric tightly in her grasp. "After your sister... your father... you're all I have left."
Nothing Godric could say would help, so he kept his mouth firmly closed and tightened his grip around her and let her cry and reassure herself that he was still there.
By the time they separated, the tent had emptied. Dani dashed her hands under her eyes and said, "Alright, enough tears. Now, what were you thinking dancing with a dragon if you could have just called the egg to you?"
- - - - Founders - - - -
Godric escaped the throng of people as soon as he could. After being angry with him for so long, most of the student body of Hogwarts wanted to talk to him and say something. He didn't like the abrupt change in personality in a lot of the children.
However, there was finally a break - thanks to Harry, Hermione, and Luna allowing him to escape - and he could make his way to the laboratory. The others hadn't made it yet, if they were coming. The number of people that had almost caught him had been quite staggering.
Still, he had been determined, he finally made it there, and it was blissfully quiet. He went to his easel, determined to paint the dragon when she had blocked out the sun. She had been quite beautiful and terrifying, and he wanted to see if he could replicate it.
Looking at the different paints, Godric stuck his hands in his pocket and jumped high into the air when sharp teeth dug into a finger.
He carefully extracted a rumpled looking dragon who blearily huffed a tiny stream of fire at him before curling back into a ball.
He stared at it as it went back to sleep.
He sent a message via the rings.
Sal
A minute passed. He sat. Two minutes passed. He went to put the dragon down in his lap, but it curled its tail around his wrist and dug its claws into his flesh. The ring warmed and he let the dragon be.
Ric
Do you want a dragon?
Another minute went by and the dragon released its tight hold on him.
What did you do?
Transfigured dragon.
The tiny wings flared and fluttered before it settled down.
Where are you?
Laboratory.
He'd paint the scene later.
A/N-Elipsa: I looked through the book again and checked the wiki. Nowhere does it say that the egg had been enchanted so it could not be summoned. No one tried to summon the thing. So... Godric tried and it worked.
He was disappointed.
For reference, this dragon can shoot fire up to forty feet away, which is roughly where Godric was when she first shot fire at him. He was a bit closer with the second round, so he had a small margin of time to react - which he did. Hope that helps clear any confusion up.
14 meters is roughly 46 feet.
And jeez, Skeeter took over for more of this chapter than I had planned. What the hell, woman?