Chapter 10
The next morning brought a small surprise for Harry, as he woke to what felt like the small hum of distant voices in the back of his head. While he slowly made his way through grogginess towards being actually awake, he tried to find the source of the voices. After spending a quarter hour staring at his wall and trying to figure out what it was he was hearing, he finally pinned it down.
He was hearing the small talk and general conversation of the house elves. Damn, he thought to himself, I must have put a lot more into the bond than I thought I did. Almost as soon as the thought left his head, an elf he had never seen before (from the back of his mind he knew with certainty that the elf's name was Tulip, and she was the daughter of an Elvin couple that were members of the grounds crew) popped into his lab and handed him a strong cup of tea.
"Yes, Master Harry Potter, sir. We's never had as much energy in our bond as we's do now. We's almost not sure what to do with it all!," she threw her hands up in the air at this, Harry reflected that he had never seen such an expressive elf outside of Dobby, "We's used a small part of the energy you gave us to keep a bit of the connection between us open. It makes it easier for us to helps you if you need it. We's thought it was the least we could do."
Tulip gave a curtsy and popped away to another task. Harry sent her a mental thank you and got the curious sensation of a mental smile in response. He spent a moment lamenting his tendency towards absolute weirdness, but simply gave it up as a bad job. He couldn't do normal if he tried. At least the tea was very good.
When he finished his tea he went down to the kitchens and grabbed a small breakfast. He pledged his help to the elves with the dinner dishes, and went back to his lab to get further into the notebook he had received from Ollivander just a month ago.
The Tebo was a magical warthog-like creature, a class 4 according to the ministry. It, like most warthogs, was very tough and was a true survivor type while in its own element. It was remarkable for its ability to become completely invisible, and it's hide was prized for its affinity for disillusionment and strength in general as protective clothing. It had nothing on dragon hide, but was extremely useful in its own right.
The notebook Ollivander had given him detailed a very specific curing and tanning process for the hide that would allow it to be used as a focus for magical energy. The Tebo was a native of the Congo and areas of Zaire, and the groups of magic users who used its hide for focuses in that region generally made traditional tribal shields. They channeled truly impressive amounts of defensive magic through them too, if Ollivander's notes were to be believed.
Ollivander had made some notes in the margins on how he felt the process could be altered for the channeling of more general magic but his notes were theoretical, and from what Harry understood, shaky at best. He ran his hand through his hair idly as he read further and further through the notebook. It looked like what he was doing was going to be fairly new and almost completely unique. The plans Harry had made for the use of the pentagrams would help stabilize magic as it passed through and was focused by the bracer he planned to make, but the problem was the hide itself. The curing process Ollivander described made the hide ripe for channeling defensive magic, but it would be rubbish for any other charms, and Harry shuddered to think what it would be like if he attempted to use it for his own favored path, transfiguration.
The potions used in the tanning process, Harry found, were just general tanning potions mixed with a tiny amount of the user's blood, then used in a precise manner. It looked like the active magical influence in the defensive usage of the hide was the hide itself, and the blood was just to ensure the magical signatures matched. So maybe if he modified the tanning process to inundate the leather with another magical influence? Or maybe he could enhance the rigidity of the bracer by applying layers of a magically reactive lacquer? It frustrated Harry to no end that he could actually use the guidance of a potions master with this project, but Snape would hit himself with a crucio where the sun didn't shine before he helped his dead rival's son.
All of this called for a lot of research, not the least of which would be into whether or not he could even get a supply of the leather for his use. If nothing else, it was an excellent starting off point, and he really didn't want to be set back to square one by not even being able to use Tebo Leather, if he could help it at least. This led him back to the goblins. He had sent off Hedwig yesterday with a list of things he needed to Gemshaper and Ragnok.
Goblins, he suspected based on his interactions with them in the past, were nothing if not paragons of efficiency. Harry would be very surprised to not have a response from them today. He quickly took measurements from his arm for a basic size, then multiplied it by 4 and wrote a note similar to the one he had already sent asking after prices and availability. He'd swing by the owlery when he went up to the library later.
With a thought, Harry called out to Tulip again, and she popped into being in front of him.
"Hows can I help you, Master Harry Potter Sir?"
Harry began with a smile, "You can just call me Harry, and I'm sorry to bother you again, but aside from Nifty you're the only elf whose name I know. Where does mail go when a student isn't in the great hall to receive it?"
"It's no problem, master Harry, we's always happy to help," Her face lit with a smile at this, "If an owl arrives with no one to deliver to, they gives their delivery to us elves, and we get it to the student."
"Tulip, could you do me a favor and ask the elves that take care of mail to bring my mail here, to my lab?"
"Of course, Master Harry, sir!"
And just as Harry began to say thanks, she popped away. Harry shook his head with a grin, the elves were a little crazy, but were certainly helpful. He loved the lot of them.
Harry stood up and stretched, it was about lunch time, so he applied his usual notice-me-not to himself, and set off to the kitchen. He set the spell on himself at this point just to keep attention off of him in the halls. The professors knew where to find him, or Flitwick did at any rate, and Luna had people to sit with so he had no reason to let anyone see him. That and it amused him to let the Gryffindors suffer by not knowing where he was. If he was any judge of the mood in the lion's tower, he knew that they would be going spare trying to find him to apologize and try to make up for losing face in front of the other houses like that. Harry also imagined that the folks who lost prefect and captaincy positions would be trying to get in his good graces for the hope that he would put in a good word with McGonagall for them.
All in all it added up to an incredibly annoying hallway situation for him. A notice-me-not was just good policy for now. He'd deal with it in two or three days. He didn't want to go for much longer without his friends, and he could fill these days with a lot of research. He finished his lunch, renewed his vow to help with the dinner dishes, and hit the library.
Three days later, Harry had made a lot of progress, and had a lot of fun at the expense of the Gryffindors. Evidently Gred and Forge had never considered the benefits of over powered notice-me-nots as applied to the noble art and science of pranking. The tower had been hell for the last day or so, for anyone whose name was on the paper Harry had incinerated at least.
Harry made sure his uniforms were house color free, and waited near where the staircase that dropped the 'Claws out next to the Great Hall. After waiting for just a few minutes, his favorite raven made her dreamy way down to the hall, and he followed her inside, snagging a seat next to her.
"Morning, Luna," He said brightly.
Harry didn't think he could rightly call what she said a response, it was more like a mumbled slurry of offensive and borderline racist expletives. He found her continuing aversion to the morning hilarious. He honestly didn't know she had this level of vitriol in her, she was so bubbly usually!
"Ah, I missed you too!," He said as he poured her a second coffee, to replace the first that she had made vanish somehow between two blinks.
It was still early for the regular student population. Not many missed breakfast, so Harry expected the rumor mill to get into gear in around a half hour. It was actually a surprising trend that the worst of the gossips made it to breakfast late. The Ravenclaw table hosted a few Beauxbatons students who decided they like a solid English breakfast, or in the case of a few students decided they like a solid Englishman. Harry thought it seemed pretty quick for them to be snogging during breakfast, the schools had only been together a week or so, but what did he know.
The hall got louder and louder as more people moved slowly in. Harry waved Neville over to him, and Luna began the construction of one of her unholy breakfast monstrosities (today it was toast surrounding pancakes, eggs, a smattering of bacon, and a light drizzle of syrup).
Halfway through breakfast, the Gryffs finally noticed the lack of a Neville, and consequently the presence of a Harry. Harry picked up on it because the volume jumped up a big step and he heard his name being whispered in drastically increasing amounts from their direction. Less than five minutes after they noticed him, a delegation of former prefects and Angelina made a tentative approach to him. Harry shot a glance at the staff table, it seemed McGonagall was as anxious as the approaching group, this was going to go poorly for all of them and he really only felt bad for Minerva. He really hoped he could talk to her later about this.
"Harry," Began the brown haired seventh year prefect, before Harry interjected, "No, sorry, my friends call me Harry, I'd prefer Mr. Potter."
He wasn't going to give them an inch. Even a year previously he might have, but he'd gone too far. Too much had happened. He might have felt bad if he had burned the bridge, but the Gryffs had set fire to it and he felt no real desire to rebuild. The prefect looked a strange combination of angry and ashamed at this.
"Mr. Potter then, we all," He indicated the group behind him, "wanted to ask you to come back and eat at the Gryffindor table. We want to officially apologize for the act of censure, we made it without all the information we needed, and it was wrong. We would like to ask you to put our colors back on your uniform, we would be honored if you would."
Harry took a moment to make them sweat further, and to finish his sip of tea.
"Nah, I'm good how I am. Thanks though."
The group looked stunned. In fact the whole hall seemed stunned. He had really been the purest Gryffindor since he first arrived. From his going to save the stone to his going for Sirius the year previous, he charged forward with the best of them. Harry figured none of the people in the hall saw this coming. Even Dumbledore in his golden chair at the front of the hall seemed to display a ghost of surprise on his face.
In truth, Harry didn't care anymore. He may not have years of history with them, but he found a couple real friends who weren't jealous or rude (Luna before eleven am notwithstanding). He even had the love and support of the Lady Hogwarts. He, for once, had no need of the people in front of him. They had wronged him at the end of a very bad day for him, and he didn't think he could forgive them.
An angry Ron moved forward in the group, "A real Gryffindor would come back and forgive us, we just made a mistake! You have to forgive us! I'm your best mate, you should talk to me at least!"
Harry took a bite of the rasher of bacon on his plate and decided to seize on the first part of Ron's rage filled proclamation, "Guess I'm not a real Gryffindor then, huh?"
Harry made a request of the Lady, he knew it was a little vindictive, but it seemed she shared a bit of his anger with the group before him as the sword of Gryffindor materialized in his hand on the table before him.
"Sure makes this awkward, doesn't it?," Harry said while giving the sword a bit of a wave, much like a child would while playing at being a knight and pretending a stick was a sword, before he simply let it go. As it left his hand, the Lady reclaimed it and moved it back to the display case in the headmaster's office. Harry idly wondered if he could do that on his own, he was the one to reclaim the sword after all. Around him the hall floundered, even the foreign students didn't know what to make of him magically conjuring a jeweled sword without using a wand, and banishing it just as easily. McGonagall had her hands over her face in shame, and the group in front of him was, to a man, wide mouthed in confusion and awe of the boy they had so snuffed.
Harry hadn't meant to make as much of a statement as he had. He had just wanted to tell them off a bit, the whole thing with the sword had been very spur of the moment. He wasn't sure where to go from here, and he had really painted his former housemates into a corner in terms of viable responses. He looked down at his plate, and found that he was basically done with his breakfast. So Harry stood up, and looked to Neville and Luna.
"Meet you two for some study time after lunch?," Two nods met this, "Library?," Two more nods, "Okay, see you then." He gave Luna's hand a squeeze this time.
Harry looked over at the Gryffindor table to see his two red-headed brothers staring at him in awe. He shot them both a wink, "Gonna join us, guys?," Two more nods. Harry took a page out of the twin's book, and gave them all something to stare at. He threw a jaunty salute to the room at large, and reflected that he really needed to learn how to actually whistle as he left the hall.
The next day was Sunday, November 6th, 1994. Harry Potter had a lot to do. In defense of his new discovered work ethic, his work was all due to the day before, and most of it consisted of meeting with his professors and reestablishing contact. He had not really spoken to any of them in about a week. By this time usually he would have had about two or three extra lessons apiece from McGonagall and Flitwick, and he knew that it was his fault. He also knew that he really did not want to meet with an irate and magically powerful Scotswoman, or an irate and damn impressive four time European dueling cup champion. He had to. They deserved better after all.
He owed McGonagall his first meeting. Not only was she more likely to kill him (at least he'd be spared Flitwick's wrath that way, or worse, his disappointment), but she was his head of house, and he hadn't spoken to her after all his decidedly hostile acts towards said house. He set up a meeting with her for after breakfast that day.
He entered her office full of trepidation, and he found her with a curious mix of sad and stern on her face. She looked as if she was going to start out the meeting and went as far as opening her mouth, but before she got the chance Harry wanted to get his feelings out first.
"Wait! Please, let me say my piece first. I really want to apologize to you. I'm sorry for not talking to you at any point during the last few days, and I'm very sorry for not talking to you about any of the things I've done in public for the last few days. I know how much you value our house pride, and I know how much it must have hurt seeing your lions and my reaction to them in the last few days. I know it must have hurt you, especially with the other schools here, and I really want you to know that despite what it looked like I meant nothing I did to reflect on you. My house abandoned me, and it came at the end of a terrible day, which was after a number of bad years. I've never had a lot of support here, and after what they said I was just done. I won't apologize for what I did, but I will wholeheartedly apologize for any stress or shame it caused you."
He looked contrite because he felt it. Harry genuinely liked McGonagall. She had her faults, she hadn't ever really listened to him before, between the stone, the basilisk, and what he was now calling the Sirius debacle. She had sat back during the whole heir of Slytherin thing as well. All in all she had done him a number of disservices.
This year she had come close to making up for her indiscretions. She had noticed him in classes. She had taken him on for extra tuition with a will, and she had been the one to give him a truth potion to prove his innocence. What's more, when she did it she gave him a choice. On balance, she probably had done less good than harm to him, but he could sense the person behind her stern appearance. It peeked through during their extra lessons. He saw the woman who had survived a war and losing her husband, only to come out the other side and still be a real person. He liked her, and that meant the world to him.
Her indiscretions, as Harry had put it internally, had not escaped her. She had, in fact, spent the days Harry had hidden himself away from the world thinking about just that. She couldn't believe the stupidity of those among her cubs that she had put in charge. Her heart bled when Harry spoke one of the oldest forms of wizarding oaths on his life and magic. The son of her two favorite students should have never been pushed to that.
Before he had interrupted her she had been about to make a similar apology to him. His words had warmed her heart. She knew he couldn't fail to be aware of how she had failed him since he came into the wizarding world. That he was willing to beat her to the punch and display his care before her own worried expression gave way to a worried apology. She was a little angry, to be sure, but she and her cubs deserved what they had gotten.
"Harry... I don't know where to begin. I... a part of me wants to hex you and a part of me wants to cry. And if you tell another soul I said that you won't see graduation," she said, a hint of humor shining through their mutual concern, "I want to ask you to come back to the tower, don't think I missed you sleeping in that lab of yours. I want to tell you to accept Brickleburry's apology," so that was the seventh year's name, Harry thought. It had been bugging him a little, "but I can't. We deserve what you've done, as much as I don't like it."
Harry saw her concern. It validated what he had already been feeling, so he tried for the middle ground for them, "Can we call it even? Would you still be willing to teach me above your normal lessons?"
Minerva smiled, "Of course. I hoped you used your time off well, because I plan on working you hard until the first task. Professors and members of each school may not be able to offer extra assistance, but our lessons predate the tournament, so we may safely continue them."
Harry returned her smile. They ironed out the details of his extra lessons and finished the conversation in an amiable mood. Harry was glad that she had thought about her actions in regards to him from previous years. Not only did it show she cared, but it entirely justified his writing off of her earlier behavior. They parted with her giving him a muggle book on the idea of the infinite (he had managed a permanent conjuration of a small stone, but anything bigger and he still lost it) called Infinity and the Mind: The Science and Philosophy of the Infinite. Like her others, he figured the math would escape him, but the philosophy would likely get him somewhere closer to what he wanted.
He met with Flitwick after lunch, and surprisingly his conversation had little to do with his performance in the great hall or his disappearance from his classes.
"Mr. Potter...," Harry audibly gulped and looked nervous at the address, "Harry," Flitwick continued with a smile, "I have recently received a communication from the clan halls of my old home. A communication from the highest levels, the clan chief himself, a man I would have never hoped to speak with, even with my accomplishments among us wand-bearers," the half goblin's smile grew to much larger and more terrifying proportions, "The esteemed Ragnok, a warrior and banker both worthy of his title, sent me a missive asking my opinion of one Harry James Potter. He said that he had received a letter from this student using all of the old and correct forms of address and respect, bearing the recommendation of the master wand crafter Ollivander himself. A curious order for what he could only assume would form the basis of an incredibly powerful magical focus. He wished to know if I felt this student was one of the few wand-bearers to truly appreciate the craft of enchantment, and one of the few who would be a friend to our nation."
Harry's head was swimming. He was honestly terrified. He had sent his letter exactly as Ollivander's notes had specified. He had used only the highest forms of respect he could find. He remembered the nip he had gotten from Hedwig when he had told her that it was especially important that she show as much dignity and respect as she could muster (She had seemed to say, as if I would do anything less!). How could he have missed that he was corresponding to the clan chief of the Gringotts goblins! Any mistake could lead to an interspecies conflict! If he had messed up badly he could have an entire clan of angry goblins declare war on him!
"Er... What did you tell him, sir?"
"Nothing but the truth," Fillius paused and a visible bead of sweat formed on Harry's forehead, "That one Harry James Potter was a student as good as his mother, a veritable prodigy, that he had a talent for enchantment I haven't seen since my days in the mines of my father's people. That my student wasn't a goblin-friend," Harry had a near heart attack, he had soaked in some of Binn's favorite and only topic, he had no desire to be on the wrong side of goblin steel, "He was a friend period, goblin or no goblin had nothing to do with it."
Flitwick was obviously enjoying playing Harry like a violin. He knew his people's reputation for violence at the slightest offense to their honor, and he knew how well deserved it was.
"Harry, I believe you might find Mistress of Procurement Gemshaper, and her much esteemed mate, happy to deal with you. Your family have traditionally all been well respected by the goblin nation. The Potters have more often than not held your own beliefs regarding other magical sentients. Have no fear, my friend."
Flitwick looked on Harry fondly. He deserved the scares he had gotten for his behavior recently, but Fillius truly did count the boy among his friends. In their private lessons, he had gotten to know Harry, and in doing so he lost what he had felt about the boy-who-lived and gained quite a bit more. The boy reminded the half-goblin so much of both his parents.
Generations of prejudice on all sides had left Fillius quite unable to find a mate, but in many ways he considered every one of his ravens and many of the students at Hogwarts his own children. He was a much loved professor for the passion he got from that sentiment. Only the blind, deaf, and dumb would doubt his mastery of his discipline, and he brought that to all of his children. Harry was moving rapidly from another one of his brood, to the place of an honored companion. He had brought a fresh wind of passion into the diminutive professor's life, and Flitwick tried to treat him accordingly.
They too, ironed out their schedules for extra lessons. Flitwick also expressed his understanding of Harry's difficulties with his house, and gave his blessing to Harry living out of his lab for the foreseeable future (with the obvious caveat that he take appropriate precautions towards his own safety).
Harry's day continued apace. An elf (Nothe, son of the previous caretakers of the owlery, Harry was getting better with their names) delivered more mail from Sirius, who was in no uncertain terms unimpressed with Harry's entrance into the tournament. The old dog had a few choice words about Dumbledore and Moody both, each of whom he felt should have been equal to the task of guarding a stationary cup from any of these shenanigans.
Sirius said that he wanted to come back to England, but Harry had anticipated that and shouted him down. Well, he had asked Hedwig to deliver a letter and batter him about the head until he agreed to not come by. Harry figured that if Padfoot was able to send increasingly flamboyant birds (who knew a peacock could actually deliver a letter, honestly? As if anyone missed that swooping down into the great hall) back with letters, he was likely in a much better place than he could ever find here in the Scottish highlands.
In typical Padfoot style though, there was a gem buried underneath his amusing insults to Snape and some physically improbable scenarios between Harry and, "The bird I refuse to name in defense of her honor and my bodily integrity" (he had gone as far as 'Lovegood by name, love very good by reputation' once before Harry mentioned the stunning new neutering techniques the mundanes were investigating). Sirius had asked a very good question. All of the champions were from a specific school, and had a person on the judging panel. What school had he been entered under, and who did he have to represent his interests as part of the board of judges?
Harry sent an owl off to both Mr. Crouch and Dumbledore. He figured one or the other would either know the answer, or help him. He was sure there were stringent rules governing the board of judges, and he would honestly be surprised if he was not allowed one by the rules. In his experience things were never fair though, so held little actual hope.
He ate dinner with Luna and Nev, both of whom he was glad to spend time with again. He needed his three days apart from everyone to get his head back on straight, but he had sorely missed their influence. Neville was timid, but very, very grounded (no plant pun intended, Harry thought sourly), he was an amazing connection to reality. Luna was so all over the place that she brought Harry out of his head. He tended to reflect everything that happened inward, and she simply was the most amazing possible way to break him out of his normal brooding.
As dinner ended, he took Luna's hand beneath the table and gave it a squeeze. It had become kind of a thing for them, and he had missed it during his self-imposed exile. The Lady of the Castle spent a little time each day reassuring both of them that they weren't doing anything wrong, and to have courage. They each separately took that advice to heart, and for the two that small connection at the end of their meals together was a balm to each of their weary souls. Harry, a scarred recovering victim of abuse, and Luna, a daughter without a real caretaker and no one to speak to. Neither knowing what to do, but both moving forward nonetheless.
Harry left his friends in the entrance hall and after a confrontation with Malfoy (Potter Stinks? Really? His brain dead cousin could do better at half Malfoy's age) he sunk his annoyance down into his center, and made his way to the kitchens to assist in doing the dishes.
The elves rarely let him do more than scrub plates, and then only the ones most lightly soiled. He knew that they could do their job faster without him, and he also knew they had constructed him a special sink and area of counter space out of the way of the rest of their work. He could feel their appreciation for the respect he was trying to show them though. When they left the small connection open to him after he gave them that boost, Nifty had not needed to talk to anyone about him helping out. They couldn't hear him well in their own communication network, but they could feel why he wanted to do it, and they were more than happy to let him do something small to help. He had basically been a house elf for the first decade of his life, after all.
Harry's days found a strange routine for the next few weeks until the First Task. He spent most of his day in the library surrounded by pages of arithmetic calculations and potions references. Many Gryffindors had set out to find him, but a day spent studying warding lent itself to the warding of a table in the back of the library with a permanent notice me not attached to it, keyed only to Harry and his friends. Harry had a minor confrontation with Madam Pince over it, but in return for showing her the charms Bill had taught him to hide his illegal Arcanum and an explanation of how they could be used on the entire restricted section, she chose to let his table go.
Harry made sure to meet his friends between classes, and with his rapidly expanding understanding of how magic was channeled, as well as general transfiguration and charms, he helped all of them make quick work of their homework. Neville benefited most from his help, as with a wand actually tuned to him he was quickly coming to challenge Hermione for first to finish a spell correctly in practicals.
After classes finished for the day he spent a considerable amount of time with McGonagall and Flitwick. He finally found the understanding, or perhaps mental attitude necessary to permanently conjure almost anything. Some things resisted conjuration, gold and what Minerva called mithril (Harry suspected it was something like titanium or aluminum, and was surprised she didn't know given her muggle references for infinity) he could only do in very small amounts. McGonagall was astounded that he could do it at all, and after their third lesson experimenting with it she finally told him why. Gold and mithril were magically reactive, and it was theoretically impossible for anyone to conjure them permanently, most masters could only barely do it temporarily. It seemed he had the penchant for breaking rules that Snape had always accused him of after all.
He corresponded with his goblin contacts a few times. It turned out that a number of his ingredients were proving difficult to track down. Re'em blood, freely given metamorphmagus hair, and unadulterated Tebo hide being among the worst offenders. Their correspondence, when Harry read between the lines, seemed to indicate that Gemshaper was frustrated she couldn't get a hold of his requests more quickly, so Harry made sure to tell her that speed was not a priority. Ideally he'd have them all before the second task, whatever it turned out to be.
Harry's schedule was interrupted only twice during the lead up to the task. First came a few days after his owls to the Headmaster and Mr. Crouch. He was invited to the headmaster's office (Spider's eyes? Harry looked up the candy later and they turned out to be a magical jawbreaker. He had lived amongst spiders enough to have no interest.) and he arrived to find an argument running between the ministry representative and the esteemed headmaster.
It seemed the rules were in his favor, and Mr. Crouch was insisting another judge be added, and for some reason he also seemed adamant that it be Moody. The man in question was in the corner of the room, his eye spinning wildly, and with every appearance of being ready to be attacked in the headmaster's own office.
Dumbledore seemed equally adamant that the traditions be maintained as much as possible in the face of the change of a fourth contestant. His comments, which were so verbose Harry didn't feel the need to pay any special attention to them, seemed to indicate he felt he was a more than adequate representative for both Harry and Cedric.
Harry sat through them trading the same points back and forth for over half an hour before realizing he was missing the beginning of dinner with Luna (and Neville he amended internally), so he decided to speak up.
"Do any of you have my piece of parchment from the goblet?," his words seemed to catch the two men off guard, as they had actually forgotten he had been invited for the discussion.
Dumbledore opened a number of drawers in his desk, and after a moment of searching and a murmured accio he produce the slip in question. He handed it to Harry, and after an instant's glance, Harry declared, "I have no listed school. So I am simply in a category all my own. Headmaster, you can't represent me, because you should be looking out for Cedric, he is the only real Hogwarts champion. I need someone involved in the decision making and planning who is there to look out for me and me alone. Why don't you let me have Professor Flitwick? He has always been fair to me, he isn't my own head of house and so won't be biased strongly for me, and all of the other professors either have less experience than him, or are obviously biased in another direction."
Harry's moment of insight seemed to tip the scales in Crouch's favor, though he did have a somewhat pained look on his face when it was decided that Flitwick would in fact represent Harry instead of Moody. Harry was glad, even outside his terrifying appearance the strange man had been giving Harry the willies all year long. Harry hadn't had a vision or bleeding scar since he entered the castle and the protection of the Lady Hogwarts, something about Moody reminded him of the visions.
The second interruption came in the form of an event Harry nearly missed. The elves had woken him up early, Tulip was actually the one to pop in and wake him. Members of the grounds crew (Tulip's family) had been called in to prepare a large clearing in the forbidden forest, and they had discovered what they felt would be part of the first task.
The elves had been forbidden to reveal any details of the competition to any of the champions, but they had gotten together and with a strange sense of urgency had told Harry it would be in his best interests to take a walk near the forest.
Harry reflected that he hadn't spent a day outside the castle in far too long, and without any further ideas had decided to just go visit Hagrid. Harry had seen his first friend during classes and spoke to him then, but he hadn't had the time this year to visit him in his house. When Harry made his way through the November weather to the half-giant's cabin, he found it surprisingly empty. Harry guessed his friend simply had class or was out somewhere, and found himself simply wandering absently around the edge of the forest.
More than once he noticed compulsions of middling strength slide across the outside of his shield, but without any other data he just assumed it was something the professors had started doing to keep people like his brothers away from the Acromantula colony. If his memories were right, they were between the school and the colony anyway.
After whiling most of the day away outside, a visibly upset Colin Creevey ran up to him out of breath.
"HARRY! huff huff huff Harry! huff huff need you inside huff late for meeting."
Harry grabbed the smaller boy by the shoulders to steady him. He looked like he had run around the entirety of Hogwarts, and Harry suspected that was actually what happened as Colin was looking for him.
Once Colin had caught his breath he explained Harry was needed at a meeting for the tournament inside, and they had been combing the castle for him for over an hour. The younger Gryffindor led Harry through the halls to a room that contained a very bored looking collection of people.
A sleeping photographer with a hat over his face sat in the corner of the room, and a very bored Ludo Bagman was sitting next to Crouch and Ollivander, who were idly discussing applications of mind magics. When Harry entered the room, Bagman kicked the photographer's chair, and Crouch and Ollivander stood and motioned him over to the table they sat at. Bagman crossed to Harry and shook his hand.
"Harry Potter! Good to see you, we've been looking all over for you! What with you taking champion's privileges to get out of all of your classes we had a devil of a time doing it too! Eventually Mr. Creevey here thought to ask a house elf were you were and was sent out to retrieve you. You missed the other champions, but we still need you to have your wand looked at!"
It turned out Harry had missed the other champions and most of the press at what was supposed to be a 'Weighing of the Wands'. It was supposed to be a ceremony to ensure their most important equipment was ready for the competition, though it meant nothing to him even beyond the fact that he didn't want to compete. Ollivander took a cursory glance at his wand, knowing as he did that Harry probably hadn't used it for a few months. Bagman was having a word with Colin, about what sounded like where he had found Harry.
With the loosely observed formalities out of the way, Harry went to the photographer. He had a couple photos taken of him, and before the man could pack up completely to leave, Harry took him aside, "Hey, is it possible to get a small statement in with you? I'm guessing I missed the reporters, which is fine in my book, but I'd like to get a word in if I could."
The man agreed (A word from the boy-who-lived? Who knew, maybe he could get a pay bump out of this!) and Harry went on, "I'm sorry I was so hard to find, but I'm glad I missed everyone at the weighing. I'm only in this competition by accident. I had nothing to do with my entrance, and I would rather not be involved. Cedric is the real champion from Hogwarts, and Delacour and Krum are the real other champions."
The photographer took his statement and shook his hand before he left, the rest quickly following suit. Harry left and resumed his prowling the outskirts of the forest, only to find that the compulsions he had noticed earlier were orders of magnitude stronger. Harry paused.
Why would they be stronger, he thought. Nothing changed since Colin found me out here... except that Colin found me out here. They knew I was out here. They're hiding something in the forest!
Harry gave himself a smack in the head. He had been able to resist the compulsion before, but now it was too strong for his shields. He could try to overpower it and break through, but he'd put galleons to knuts that they had someone watching him now. He missed his chance to figure out the first task