The Goblet of Fire
♦ ♦ ♦ ♦
Sure enough, when they entered the Gryffindor common room it exploded with cheers and yells again. There were mountains of cakes and flagons of pumpkin juice and butterbeer on every surface, Lee Jordan had let off some Filibuster's Fireworks so that the air was thick with stars and sparks; and Dean Thomas, who was very good at drawing, had put up some impressive new banners, most of which depicted Harry zooming around the Horntail's head on his Firebolt. However, a couple showed Simon with his head on fire which Sadie did not find amusing.
Harry helped himself to food and sat down with Sadie, Ron and Hermione.
"Blimey, this is heavy," said Lee Jordan, picking up the golden egg, which Harry had left on a table, and weighing it in his hands. "Open it, Harry, go on! Let's just see what's inside it!"
"He's supposed to work out the clue on his own," Hermione said swiftly. "It's in the tournament rules."
"I was supposed to work out how to get past the dragon on my own too," Harry muttered, so only Sadie and Hermione could hear him, and they grinned rather guiltily.
"Yeah, go on, Harry, open it!" several people echoed.
Lee passed Harry the egg, and Harry dug his fingernails into the groove that ran all the way around it and prised it open.
It was hollow and completely empty, but the moment Harry opened it, the most horrible noise, a loud and screechy wailing, filled the room. The nearest thing to it Sadie had ever heard was the ghost orchestra at Nearly Headless Nick's deathday party, who had all been playing the musical saw.
"Shut it!" Fred bellowed, his hands over his ears.
"What was that?" said Seamus Finnigan, staring at the egg as Harry slammed it shut again. "Sounded like a banshee. Maybe you've got to get past one of those next, Harry!"
"It was someone being tortured!" said Neville, who had gone very white and spilled sausage rolls all over the floor. "You're going to have to fight the Cruciatus Curse!"
"Don't be a prat, Neville, that's illegal," said George. "They wouldn't use the Cruciatus Curse on the champions. I thought it sounded a bit like Percy singing, maybe you've got to attack him while he's in the shower. Harry."
"Want a jam tart girls?" said Fred. Sadie and Hermione looked doubtfully at the plate he was offering them. Fred grinned. "It's all right," he said. "I haven't done anything to them. It's the custard creams you've got to watch. . . ."
Neville, who had just bitten into a custard cream, choked and spat it out. Fred laughed.
"Just my little joke, Neville. . . ."
Sadie and Hermione took a jam tart. Then Hermione said, "Did you get all this from the kitchens, Fred?"
"Yep," said Fred, grinning at her. He put on a high-pitched squeak and imitated a house-elf. "'anything we can get you, sir, anything at all!' They're dead helpful, get me a roast ox if I said I was peckish."
"How do you get in there?" Hermione said in an innocently casual sort of voice.
"Easy," said Fred, "concealed door behind a painting of a bowl of fruit. Just tickle the pear, and it giggles and. . . ." He stopped and looked suspiciously at her. "Why?"
"Nothing," said Hermione quickly.
"Going to try and lead the house-elves out on strike now, are you?" said Fred, stealing Cassie's jam-tart and causing him to get a smack on the arm. "Going to give up all the leaflet stuff and try and stir them up into rebellion?"
Several people chortled. Hermione didn't answer.
"Don't you go upsetting them and telling them they've got to take clothes and salaries!" said George warningly. "You'll put them off their cooking!"
Just then, Neville caused a slight diversion by turning into a large canary.
"Oh, sorry, Neville!" Fred shouted over all the laughter. "I forgot, it was the custard creams we hexed. . . ."
Within a minute, however, Neville had molted, and once his feathers had fallen off, he reappeared looking entirely normal. He even joined in laughing.
"Canary Creams!" Fred shouted to the excitable crowd. "George and I invented them, seven Sickles each, a bargain!"
It was nearly one in the morning when Sadie finally went up to the dormitory with Hermione, Lavender, Tracey and Parvati.
♦ ♦ ♦ ♦
The start of December brought wind and sleet to Hogwarts. Drafty though the castle always was in winter. Sadie was glad of its fires and thick walls every time she passed the Durmstrang ship on the lake, which was pitching in the high winds, its black sails billowing against the dark skies. She thought the Beauxbatons caravan was likely to be pretty chilly too. Hagrid, she noticed, was keeping Madame Maxime's horses well provided with their preferred drink of single-malt whiskey. The fumes wafting from the trough in the comer of their paddock was enough to make the entire Care of Magical Creatures class light-headed. This was unhelpful, as they were still tending the horrible skrewts and needed their wits about them.
"I'm not sure whether they hibernate or not," Hagrid told the shivering class in the windy pumpkin patch next lesson. "Thought we'd jus' try an see if they fancied a kip. . . . we'll jus' settle 'em down in these boxes. . . ."
There were now only ten skrewts left, apparently their desire to kill one another had not been exercised out of them. Each of them was now approaching six feet in length. Their thick grey armor; their powerful, scuttling legs, their fire-blasting ends, their stings and their suckers, combined to make the skrewts the most repulsive things Sadie had ever seen. The class looked dispiritedly at the enormous boxes Hagrid had brought out, all lined with pillows and fluffy blankets.
"We'll jus' lead 'em in here," Hagrid said, "an' put the lids on, and we'll see what happens."
But the skrewts, it transpired, did not hibernate, and did not appreciate being forced into pillow-lined boxes and nailed in. Hagrid was soon yelling, "Don panic, now, don' panic!" while the skrewts rampaged around the pumpkin patch, now strewn with the smoldering wreckage of the boxes.
Most of the class, Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle in the lead, had fled into Hagrid's cabin through the back door and barricaded themselves in. Harry, Ron, Sadie and Hermione, however, were among those who remained outside trying to help Hagrid. Together they managed to restrain and tie up nine of the skrewts, though at the cost of numerous burns and cuts. Finally, only one skrewt was left.
"Don' frighten him, now!" Hagrid shouted as Sadie, Ron and Harry used their wands to shoot jets of fiery sparks at the skrewt, which was advancing menacingly on them, its sting arched, quivering, over its back. "Jus' try an slip the rope 'round his sting, so he won hurt any o' the others!"
"Yeah, we wouldn't want that!" Ron shouted angrily as he, Sadie and Harry backed into the wall of Hagrid's cabin, still holding the skrewt off with their sparks.
"Well, well, well. . . . this does look like fun."
Rita Skeeter was leaning on Hagrid's garden fence, looking in at the mayhem. She was wearing a thick magenta cloak with a furry purple collar today, and her crocodile-skin handbag was over her arm.
Hagrid launched himself forward on top of the skrewt that was cornering Sadie, Harry and Ron and flattened it. A blast of fire shot out of its end, withering the pumpkin plants nearby.
"Who're you?" Hagrid asked Rita Skeeter as he slipped a loop of rope around the skrewt's sting and tightened it.
"Rita Skeeter, Daily Prophet reporter," Rita replied, beaming at him. Her gold teeth glinted.
"Thought Dumbledore said you weren' allowed inside the school anymore," said Hagrid, frowning slightly as he got off the slightly squashed skrewt and started tugging it over to its fellows.
Rita acted as though she hadn't heard what Hagrid had said.
"What are these fascinating creatures called?" she asked, beaming still more widely.
"Blast-Ended Skrewts," grunted Hagrid.
"Really?" said Rita, apparently full of lively interest. "I've never heard of them before. . . . where do they come from?"
Sadie noticed a dull red flush rising up out of Hagrid's wild black beard, and her heart sank. Where had Hagrid got the skrewts from? Hermione, who seemed to be thinking along these lines, said quickly, "They're very interesting, aren't they? Aren't they Sades?"
"Yes," Sadie said nodding, "aren't they Harry?"
"What? Ouch, oh yeah, interesting," said Harry as she stepped on his foot.
"Ah, you're here. Harry!" said Rita Skeeter as she looked around. "So you like Care of Magical Creatures, do you? One of your favourite lessons?"
"Yes," said Harry stoutly.
"It's the best lesson we have," Sadie added as Hagrid beamed at them.
"Lovely," said Rita. "Really lovely. Been teaching long?" she added to Hagrid.
Sadie noticed her eyes travel over Dean (who had a nasty cut across one cheek). Lavender (whose robes were badly singed), Seamus (who was nursing several burnt fingers), and then to the cabin windows, where most of the class stood, their noses pressed against the glass waiting to see if the coast was clear.
"This is o'ny me second year," said Hagrid.
"Lovely. I don't suppose you'd like to give an interview, would you? Share some of your experience of magical creatures? The Prophet does a zoological column every Wednesday, as I'm sure you know. We could feature these er, Bang-Ended Scoots."
"Blast-Ended Skrewts," Hagrid said eagerly. "Er, yeah, why not?"
Sadie had a very bad feeling about this, but there was no way of communicating it to Hagrid without Rita Skeeter seeing, so she had to stand and watch in silence as Hagrid and Rita Skeeter made arrangements to meet in the Three Broomsticks for a good long interview later that week. Then the bell rang up at the castle, signalling the end of the lesson.
"Well, good-bye, Harry!" Rita Skeeter called merrily to him as he set off with Sadie, Ron and Hermione. "Until Friday night, then, Hagrid!"
"She'll twist everything he says," Harry said under his breath.
"Just as long as he didn't import those skrewts illegally or anything," said Hermione desperately. They looked at one another, it was exactly the sort of thing Hagrid might do.
"Hagrid's been in loads of trouble before, and Dumbledore's never sacked him," said Ron consolingly.
"Worst that can happen is Hagrid'll have to get rid of the skrewts," Sadie added, "sorry, did I say worst? I meant best."
Harry, Ron and Hermione laughed, and, feeling slightly more cheerful, they all went off to lunch.
♦ ♦ ♦ ♦
Sadie thoroughly enjoyed double Divination that afternoon. They were still doing star charts and predictions, but now that she, Harry and Ron were all friends once more, the whole thing seemed very funny again. Professor Trelawney, who had been so pleased with the pair of them when they had been predicting their own horrific deaths, quickly became irritated as they sniggered through her explanation of the various ways in which Pluto could disrupt everyday life.
"I would think," she said, in a mystical whisper that did not conceal her obvious annoyance, "that some of us. . . ." she stared very meaningfully at Harry ". . . .might be a little less frivolous had they seen what I have seen during my crystal gazing last night. As I sat here, absorbed in my needlework, the urge to consult the orb overpowered me. I arose, I settled myself before it, and I gazed into its crystalline depths. . . . and what do you think I saw gazing back at me?"
"An ugly old bat in outsize specs?" Sadie muttered under her breath.
Ron and Harry fought very hard to keep their faces straight.
"Death, my dears."
Parvati and Lavender both put their hands over their mouths, looking horrified.
"Yes," said Professor Trelawney, nodding impressively, "it comes, ever closer, it circles overhead like a vulture, ever lower, ever lower over the castle. . . ."
She stared pointedly at Harry, who yawned very widely and obviously.
♦ ♦ ♦ ♦
"It'd be a bit more impressive if she hadn't done it about eighty times before," Harry said as they finally regained the fresh air of the staircase beneath Professor Trelawney's room. "But if I'd dropped dead every time she's told me I'm going to, I'd be a medical miracle."
"You'd be a sort of extra-concentrated ghost," said Ron, chortling, as they passed the Bloody Baron going in the opposite direction, his wide eyes staring sinisterly. "At least we didn't get homework. I hope Hermione got loads off Professor Vector, I love not working when she is. . . ."
But Hermione wasn't at dinner, nor was she in the library when they went to look for her afterward. The only person in there was Viktor Krum. Ron hovered behind the bookshelves for a while, watching Krum, debating in whispers with Sadie and Harry whether he should ask for an autograph, but then Ron realised that six or seven girls were lurking in the next row of books, debating exactly the same thing, and he lost his enthusiasm for the idea.
"Wonder where she's got to?" Ron said as he, Sadie and Harry went back to Gryffindor Tower.
"Dunno, balderdash."
Sadie walked into the Gryffindor Tower, unaware that Hermione was running behind them.
♦ ♦ ♦ ♦
"Potter! Bridgerton! Weasley! Will you pay attention?"
Professor McGonagall's irritated voice cracked like a whip through the Transfiguration class on Thursday, and Harry, Sadie and Ron all jumped and looked up.
It was the end of the lesson. They had finished their work, the guinea fowl they had been changing into guinea pigs had been shut away in a large cage on Professor McGonagall's desk (Neville's still had feathers), they had copied down their homework from the blackboard ("Describe, with examples, the ways in which Transforming Spells must be adapted when performing Cross-Species Switches"}. The bell was due to ring at any moment, and Harry and Ron, who had been having a sword fight with a couple of Fred and George's fake wands at the back of the class, looked up, Ron holding a tin parrot and Harry, a rubber haddock while Cassie was fast asleep with her head on the table.
"Now that Potter and Weasley have been kind enough to act their age and Miss. Bridgerton has decided to wake up," said Professor McGonagall, with an angry look at the three of them as the head of Harry's haddock drooped and fell silently to the floor, Ron's parrot's beak had severed it moments before and Sadie yawned, "I have something to say to you all. The Yule Ball is approaching, a traditional part of the Triwizard Tournament and an opportunity for us to socialise with our foreign guests. Now, the ball will be open only to fourth years and above, although you may invite a younger student if you wish. . . ."
Lavender Brown let out a shrill giggle. Parvati Patil nudged her hard in the ribs, her face working furiously as she too fought not to giggle. They both looked around at Harry, Professor McGonagall ignored them, which Sadie thought was distinctly unfair, as she had just told off her, Harry and Ron.
"Dress robes will be worn," Professor McGonagall continued, "and the ball will start at eight o'clock on Christmas Day, finishing at midnight in the Great Hall. Now then. . . ." Professor McGonagall stared deliberately around the class. ". . . .the Yule Ball is of course a chance for us all to er, let our hair down," she said, in a disapproving voice.
Lavender giggled harder than ever, with her hand pressed hard against her mouth to stifle the sound. Sadie could see what was funny this time. Professor McGonagall, with her hair in a tight bun, looked as though she had never let her hair down in any sense.
"But that does NOT mean," Professor McGonagall went on, "that we will be relaxing the standards of behavior we expect from Hogwarts students. I will be most seriously displeased if a Gryffindor student embarrasses the school in any way."
The bell rang, and there was the usual scuffle of activity as everyone packed their bags and swung them onto their shoulders.
Professor McGonagall called above the noise, "Potter, a word, if you please."
"We'll wait outside," Sadie said as she and Ron walked outside and waited for Harry.
"What do you think it's about?" Ron asked as he and Sadie leant against the wall.
"I dunno really," Sadie said, furrowing her eyebrows, "oh look, here he is."
"Mate, what's up?" Ron asked, seeing the look on Harry's face. Harry explained what happened as Sadie and Ron snorted with laughter.
"Wait are you serious?" Ron asked as the three of them walked out of the Transfiguration class.
"You have to dance?" Sadie snickered as Harry groaned.
"Don't remind me," he said miserably, "I don't dance, and she said that I am a Hogwarts champion, and I will do what is expected of me as a representative of the school."
"Oh wow," Sadie said amused as she patted Harry on the back, "good luck with that."
♦ ♦ ♦ ♦
The last week of term became increasingly boisterous as it progressed. Rumours about the Yule Ball were flying everywhere, though Sadie didn't believe half of them. For instance, that Dumbledore had bought eight hundred barrels of mulled mead from Madam Rosmerta. It seemed to be fact, however, that he had booked the Weird Sisters.
Some of the teachers, like little Professor Flitwick, gave up trying to teach them much when their minds were so clearly elsewhere, he allowed them to play games in his lesson on Wednesday. Other teachers were not so generous. Nothing would ever deflect Professor Binns, for example, from plowing on through his notes on goblin rebellions, as Binns hadn't let his own death stand in the way of continuing to teach, they supposed a small thing like Christmas wasn't going to put him off.
It was amazing how he could make even bloody and vicious goblin riots sound as boring as Percy's cauldron-bottom report. Professors McGonagall and Moody kept them working until the very last second of their classes too, and Snape, of course, would no sooner let them play games in class than adopt Harry. Staring nastily around at them all, he informed them that he would be testing them on poison antidotes during the last lesson of the term.
"Evil, he is," Ron said bitterly that night in the Gryffindor common room. "Springing a test on us on the last day. Ruining the last bit of term with a whole load of studying."
"Mmm, you're not exactly straining yourself, though, are you?" said Hermione, looking at him over the top of her Potions notes. Ron was busy building a card castle out of his Exploding Snap pack. A much more interesting pastime than with Muggle cards, because of the chance that the whole thing would blow up at any second.
"It's Christmas, Hermione," said Sadie, curled up in an armchair near the fire as she was writing in her notebook.
Hermione looked severely over at her too but then turned to Harry.
"And Harry, I'd have thought you'd be doing something constructive, even if you don't want to learn your antidotes!"
"Like what?" Harry said as he watched Joey Jenkins of the Cannons belt a Bludger toward a Ballycastle Bats Chaser.
"That egg!" Hermione hissed.
"Come on, Hermione, I've got till February the twenty-fourth," Harry said.
"But it might take weeks to work it out!" said Hermione. "You're going to look a real idiot if everyone else knows what the next task is and you don't!"
"Leave him alone, Hermione, he's earned a bit of a break," said Ron, and he placed the last two cards on top of the castle and the whole lot blew up, singeing his eyebrows.
"Nice look, Ron, go well with your dress robes, that will."
It was Fred and George. They sat down at the table with Harry, Ron, Sadie and Hermione as Ron felt how much damage had been done.
"Ron, can we borrow Pigwidgeon?" George asked.
"No, he's off delivering a letter," said Ron. "Why?"
"Because George wants to invite him to the ball," said Fred sarcastically as Sadie chuckled. He then turned to his younger brother. "Because we want to send a letter, you stupid great prat."
"Who d'you two keep writing to, eh?" said Ron.
"Nose out, Ron, or I'll burn that for you too," said Fred, waving his wand threateningly. "So, you lot got dates for the ball yet?"
"Nope," said Ron.
"Well, you'd better hurry up, mate, or all the good ones will be gone," said Fred.
"Who're you going with, then?" said Ron.
"Angelina," said Fred promptly, without a trace of embarrassment. Sadie looked up, a look of hurt on her face.
"What?" said Ron, taken aback. "You've already asked her?"
"Good point," said Fred. He turned his head and called across the common room, "Oi! Angelina!"
Angelina, who had been chatting with Alicia Spinnet near the fire, looked over at him.
"What?" she called back.
"Want to come to the ball with me?"
Angelina gave Fred an appraising sort of look as Sadie watched them both.
"All right, then," she said, and she turned back to Alicia and carried on chatting with a bit of a grin on her face.
"There you go," said Fred to Harry and Ron, "piece of cake." He got to his feet, yawning, and said, "We'd better use a school owl then, George, come on. . . ."
They left.
"Sadie, you okay?" Ron asked.
"Fine," Sadie said, her voice shaking slightly as she scribbled out something in her notebook. "I'm gonna go bed, night."
And with that, she quickly closed her notebook and hurried upstairs.