Chapter 22.4- Doom Days

She didn’t walk out. She limped. Her knee was still unhealed. With some guilt, I realized that dealing with Cedric so quickly hadn’t worked out in her favour at all as she had to fight barely healed. I walked up to meet her halfway to the stage.

“You still have your magic. Diggory is an average duelist at best. You won’t have your mobility but-“

“Harry.” She called, stopping me mid-tangent.

“I am not some delicate flower for you to protect. Allow me to fight on my own merits. I made a mistake with Krum, my mind was elsewhere, but I will not be repeating that” She said. I nodded, unable to refute her words and handed over her wand. She took her position in front of Cedric. I turned back to the benches, the area that the competitors could sit with their entourage and found Krum cackling at something that one of his mates had said. It was definitely about Fleur.

“How do you think this is going to go?” Hermione, the only one on my own bench, asked.

“Fleur has this in the bag” I said.

“You don’t duel against me like that” She said, referring to the fight with Cedric.

“I try to teach you- with him, there’s no intention to teach, just a message to send” I said. She nodded. Mind still elsewhere. She was part of the reason why I’d been standing away from my bench in the first place. I did not know how to truly deal with grief, as evidenced with my inability to help Fleur. With Hermione, it was even worse. She hadn’t wanted to go with Neville, only saying yes out of some sense of pity, and then he had died saving her life.

I’d gotten the story from her between tears this morning. She had slipped with her heels and sprained her ankle. Neville had lifted her up and somehow managed to get her out of the hall but hadn’t made it out with her. Specifics of how exactly the Longbottom heir had died weren’t something I particularly cared for, but Dame Augusta had been spitting fire when she was in the Great hall as of this morning.

The whistle rang to begin the duel between Fleur and Diggory. It turns out I was wrong. He was a bit better than average in the end. With a twirl of his wand and no incantation, the stone surface of the platform shatter under a bombarda, and he used those loose rocks to great advantage. Multiple dogs ran at Fleur right from the beginning.

To her credit, she stared them down without flinching and then swished her wand while muttering something under her breath. Cedric’s own dogs turned as one and began running at him instead. A very interesting charm, I thought to myself as the Hogwarts Champion set them on fire with a muttered incantation and then fired a stunning spell right at her.