Chapter 35.5- Doom Days

My blasting curse caught it right in the had. It snapped towards my direction as my silenced feet were padding on the floor, taking me away. It sent fire roaring through the space, but managed to achieve little with that. I was already gone. Behind it now, I took a deep breath and focused my intention.

I twirled my wand, commanding the steam to thicken until even the fire elemental, despite blazing like a bonfire, was gone from my view. Why? I didn’t need the audience seeing this bit. I thought about Tom Riddle Senior, the man that had abandoned my mother and left her to her own devices because he was too ignorant to understand how she was better than he as even as a lowly squib. I thought of Vernon Dursley, the muggle who had dared lay hands on me at my most vulnerable. I thought of Reed Richards. My intent clocked into place and I whispered the words with my wand pointed carefully at centremass.

‘Avada Kedavra’. Even at a whisper, there was something about the words that just commanded attention. The elemental did actually turn in time to see the spell heading its way. Too late to dodge though. The killing curse hit, and the creature fell to the earth, fire snuffed ut like a candle before a hurricane. I tore my wand to the side, commanding a gust of wind to blow he mist away. I stared at the final obstacle, making it up there and just sighed.

At least this one was easy enough. I commanded the wind to lift me in its throes and take me where I needed to go.

—

From undisputed first place to tied for second, I thought as I did the math in my head. I scoffed and tossed the rodent on the floor. Whoever wanted could find Weasley and return him to his original form. They didn’t say it, but it was clear the judges were punishing me of both stunning Diggory and using human transfiguration on Weasley.

The long rant I got from Dumbledore about the dangers of using transfiguration on a potioned subject need not be repeated, but I knew the scolding would find some way to be immortalized in memory. Of course I’d known there could have been dangers. But what was I supposed to do? Lug him around like dead weight he is? Besides, I reasoned that the judges would not have picked something likely to have side effects and I knew I was right, but the scolding came nonetheless.

With Dumbledore against me and me so clearly ahead of their champions it probably took only some mental gymnastics for Karkoroff and Maxime to rationalize following his example in giving zeros. Even Olawoyin, the ICW rep had given me a two for my effort. In the end, my total score of ten meant I had fallen a point behind Fleur and was tied with Krum for second. Cedric, on the other hand, had earned himself a Did Not Finish, and five points for effort. He was more or less out of the competition by this point. Unless he had something massive to come up with for the third task, this was it for him, and it was clear that he knew it. The despair on his face when he glimpsed the new scoreboard would probably be the front page of a few French newspapers tomorrow.