Chapter 66

A gasp, followed by a loud bang as Atlas sat up from where she lay and smacked her head against the underside of whatever table she had slept under, echoed throughout whatever room she had crashed in. She panted, groaned and wiped the tears from her eyes all at once, looking around to try and discern where she had fallen asleep the night prior. She crawled out from underneath her makeshift bed, peering around through bleary eyes and sniffling as she stretched out limbs exhausted from the panic of last nights terror.

Something tickled at her nose, the scent of something nice, tasty and it made her hungry, made her mind clear and she realised where she was. The kitchens. She’d fallen asleep waiting for Dobby’s return. Which meant this was the next day. The next morning. The cursed dawn of the second task.

Her panic returned and Atlas sprang to her feet, disturbing the elves that were clearing up from breakfast and almost tripping over herself in the meantime. What time was it? Where was Dobby? Where was her task uniform? A loud crack sounded from beside her and she almost leapt out of her skin, spinning around to see Fobbo looking up at her through his big watery eyes.

“Fobbo! Where have you been? Wait, never mind, have you seen Dobby!?” She asked hurriedly, wiping away the effects of last nights terror when she ran her hand through her hair messily. It didn’t do her any good to dwell on dreams, not dreams she’d had since she was a child. She’d gotten used to them over time and she wasn’t about to suddenly revert to her scared child self, all because of some crisis she was having over muddled feelings.

“Fobbo has been — er — reading! Oh, yes, Fobbo is seeing Dobby on the way here, he is giving me this when we were seeing each other and is speaking to Harry Potter right now!” The elf squeaked, holding out his hand where a ball of messy and tangled, slimy-looking, greyish-green strings lay. Atlas grimaced but took the pile gratefully, eyeing the uniform the elf had in his other arm.

“Fobbo, you’re the best,” She sighed, taking the pile from him and moving over to an upturned table she used as cover to strip to her underwear, putting on the swimming trunks and sleeveless body-tight shirt that would be her clothing for the trial. It was advertising Hogwarts, just as her trial one uniform did, but it was sleeker, thinner and felt like a second skin. In a word, it was comfortable.

She slipped out from her spot, tucking the Gillyweed in her pocket as she re-tied her hair, hands shaky and chest starting to clench. At that she grimaced, rubbing at where the spot burned and scorched her very soul. Fobbo ran over to her, face contorted in concern as the girl took a moment, panting, eyes closed and trying to catch her stolen breath. The pain subsided after a long, torturous, moment and Atlas waved the elf off with a tight smile, grabbing her wand from underneath the table she’d slept and strapping it to her thigh.

“Miss Atlas, Fobbo is thinking…he is thinking you don’t look too good,” The elf admitted hesitantly.

“Nightmare, Fo. Just a nightmare and you know my heart plays up sometimes,” she told.

“Is Miss Atlas angry? Is it warning Miss Atlas?”

“Yes, I think so.”

“Then Miss Atlas should not compete!” Fobbo shrieked, his hands coming up to slap his cheeks fearfully. “Miss Atlas! Miss Amaya would not want you doing this, she would be telling you off, she would!”

“Oh, yeah? And how do you know that Fo? You don’t even know her,” Atlas grumbled.

“Miss Atlas! Fobbo is pleading! Do not compete! Miss Atlas’s heart is warning her about her magic! Miss Atlas’s magic is dangerous!”

“You think I don’t know that!?” Atlas snapped, Fobbo flinched and she frowned, rubbing between her brows. “I’m sorry…but I’m trying, I’m really trying to control it. Either way, it’s not just warning me of magic, is it Fo? It’s warning me, something is coming. Or…I don’t know but you remember these…pains, they either warn me of what’s to come, who to trust or to calm down.”

“Yes, Miss…Fobbo is sorry, he is stepping out of line…” The elf muttered, his ears dropping. Atlas glanced up, looking over at him and smiling softly as she reached out to ruffle his head fondly. She wasn’t mad at him, she didn’t think she had the facilities to be mad at Fobbo of all elves.

“You’re alright, Fobbo. I’m just tired,” she sighed, “And now I have a task to do…”

“Right! Fobbo is most forgetful! The task, it is in five minutes!” Fobbo announced and Atlas went wide-eyed, a low whine of disbelief expelling from her throat as she yelled a ‘goodbye’ and sprinted out of the Fruitbowl painting. Fobbo shouted something she hadn’t quite caught in full but she deduced it was something along the lines of ‘Fobbo will be watching!’.

That probably meant he’d watch her do the task. If she got there on time.

Her bare feet slapped against the school floors as she practically leapt down the stairs to the entrance hall. Eyes turned to her as she landed, all of them wide and amused while Atlas grunted out in desperation, shouldering open the door to the courtyard and basically flying down the lawn to the Black Lake. The cool air was a shock to her system and she found herself strangely energized as she skidded around a dock and collided with another figure. She caught them, looking into the green bespectacled eyes of her dearest god-brother.

“Harry!” / “Atlas!” They exclaimed at the same time and broke out into large grins, running the final stretch together, laughing at their own expenses when they slipped in the thick mud made mushy and sticky by last nights rainfall. Some of it splashed upon Fleur who grimaced and looked down on them in disapproval, but Atlas saw the smile she tried to withhold.

“We’re here!” Harry announced as Atlas helped him up, the two of them standing, chests heaving and uniforms on.

“Where have you two been?” A bossy, prim and proper voice snarked from behind them, Atlas turned to see Percy Weasley, once again filling in for Crouch. It really was strange, Crouch never missed days in the office, not that she knew of. The man was relentless, a true devotee to his workplace. Nobody could tear him from his work, not even his family. Atlas knew that all too well. “The task’s about to start!”

“Nice to see you too, Perce,” Atlas remarked and the boy turned his nose up at her, looking to Harry instead, waiting for his response.

“Now, now, Percy!” Bagman said, looking intensely relieved to see the two of them. “Let them catch their breath!”

Harry tugged on one of Atlas’s pockets and she inclined her head toward him, an eyebrow raised.

“They’ve got Ron.”

“What?”

“The things they took, Dobby told me the thing I must retrieve is Ron and well…he and Hermione left together last night to see McGonagall — Atlas, what I’m trying to say is–“

“They’ve got Hermione down there too?” She finished and Harry nodded, his previous grin completely wiped from his face, instead, replaced by a firm and fearful looking frown. Atlas glanced to the lake, looking upon its depths uneasily. “Merlin’s balls…didn’t Fred and George say they had to pick up someone else though? Why would McGonagall get Hogwarts students to pick up three people?”

“Maybe Fleur has to get Roger Davies?”

“Maybe,” Atlas nodded, “Or maybe…” she looked over to Krum, watching as the boy got ready to dive into the lake. “Hermione isn’t mine to retrieve.”

“Come on, Atlas…you don’t seriously think Hermione is dearer to Krum than she is to you?”

“Course not,” Atlas objected, sounding genuinely offended by the suggestion. “I’m merely saying, maybe Hermione is the only thing Krum holds dear? Which is…sad.”

“So…who would that leave you with?”

Atlas furrowed her brows in thought, the first other person that came to mind was Harry, but he was in front of her, then Ron, but he was Harry’s, then Cedric, maybe it was Cedric. That sounded likely, but then she remembered the boy was injured and though the tournament was completely immoral, she doubted the Heads’ would agree to put an injured boy at the bottom of a lake. Or maybe they would? She couldn’t rule him out entirely but continued wracking her brain for people she held dear to her.

“Maybe, Zasha?”

“No, I mean…she’s obviously a person I hold dear but there are others I hold closer,” Atlas muttered and sighed. “I guess it could be her…”

“I thought you two were like, really close?”

“I may have presented it that way but in reality…we knew each other for less than a month. Had our entire development as friends in that time period and then, after that, we never spoke again,” Atlas told, rubbing the back of her neck. “I sent her letters but she never responded, nor did she send her own.”

“But…she was so happy to see you,” Harry said and Atlas shrugged, suddenly looking glum. She hadn’t really thought about it before but, why had Zasha never responded to her letters? “There must be some explanation.”

“Yeah, I guess. It’s in the past anyway. I guess she could be what I need to retrieve but I’m sure I’m missing another possible person,” Atlas knew she was, she just couldn’t place the face, nor the name, until: “Bella, it’s got to be Bella, right?”

“That’s…yeah, could be, but why would Fred and George need to retrieve her?.”

“Dunno, I guess we’ll find out if I’m right when we get down there. Did Dobby give you the Gillyweed?”

“Oh, yeah,” Harry tucked his hand in his pocket, retrieving the slimy substance and presenting it to his god-sister before him, she grimaced and pulled out her own, letting it mingle in her palm. “Where’d you get the idea?”

“Neville.”

“Life-saver.”

“Literally,” Atlas grinned. “I don’t know what it does though. All I know is that we’ll be able to breathe underwater.”

“Good, great, ok. We’ve got this,” Harry nodded, glancing to the shore and then back to Atlas, face uncertain. “Right?”

“Totally.”

“Sonorus!” A voice shouted from behind them, and they turned to see Bagman, beaming largely as another figure came dashing out of the treeline. It was Bella. Instead of sharing the woman’s look of happiness, however, a look of confusion spread across Atlas’s features. If Bella was here, who was in the lake. Who was she close to? There was Hermione, Harry, Ron, Cedric, Fleur, Zasha, Bella…oh and–

“Ginny.”

“What?”

“Ginny’s at the bottom of the lake. Harry, she can’t swim, she’s deathly afraid of water,” Atlas panicked. “What if I can’t find her?”

“Atlas, I don’t–“

“Well, all our champions are ready for the second task, which will start on my whistle. They have precisely an hour to recover what has been taken from them. On the count of three, then. One…two…three!”

The whistle echoed shrilly upon Atlas’s ear and the girl grimaced painfully, plopping the Gillyweed in her mouth and swallowing solidly as she waded into the icy February water. It was definitely nothing like the warmth she was used to in the Summer. She glanced to her side, seeing Harry desperately chewing on his Gillyweed, stopping when they were waist-deep. Atlas stopped with him, waiting – forgetting she could go without him – for some sort of change to happen.

But she was quicker to feel it in herself than see it in Harry, as a piercing pain stabbed into the sides of her neck, she withheld the surprised cry that threatened to expel from her throat and instead went to raise her hands to where the pain had struck, only, she stopped short, looking down upon her webbed hands and then further to her webbed and elongated feet through the clear water of the shallow lake. She grinned and looked over at Harry, only to see him struggling to breathe.

She shouted the only thing logical to her at that moment, “Harry, jump in!”

He did as told and Atlas soon followed, meeting him away from the shallow edge of the lake and right by the slope that dropped, rather suddenly, a few metres in. He turned to her in confusion, eyes wide beneath his glasses as he looked at himself and then at Atlas. Apparently, he was trying to speak as well, but all that came out were bubbles of speech Atlas could not decipher. His lips were too distorted through the shine of the bubble that expelled from his tongue. It reminded her – fleetingly – of the Monster and its attempts to speak through its own smog.

“I can’t hear you,” she said and her voice carried strong, a stark contrast to Harry’s own. He looked at her, affronted and resembling someone quite hard done by, like he’d been sold some faulty broom that didn’t even take off for good money or given some shoddy advice that had fallen through after painstaking hours of studying. “Tell me after, we need to find our friends.”

Harry nodded, making an ‘ok’ symbol with his fingers and they both swam off, deep into the opaque darkness of the Black Lake. Atlas had swum in the lake many times over the summer, but her destination was always the shallow healing pools to the East, so everything popping up around her was new, nothing she’d ever seen before.

Strange figures were sudden to flash in her peripheral, and each time she would spin around, eyebrows narrowed and face pulled into one of fear. Those looming shadows messing with her mind, she kept thinking they were the Monster. Thinking it had somehow managed to transport its airy form into watery depths. It wasn’t a stretch to say her nightmare she’d woken up from mere minutes ago was fueling this deadly paranoia and to make matters worse, she’d lost sight of Harry.

“Shit…” She muttered and moved when a school of small silvery fish swam right by her head. They weren’t normal fish however and seemed to zip by he like darts, one of them snagging her shoulder and embedding itself there. Atlas grimaced, grabbing the fish and pulling it out of the hole it’d made, tossing it back on track to follow its friends.

A crop of light green weed stretched out ahead of her, like a lush field of grass. Only this grass was demented, contorted and tangled, slimy in every sense of the word and Atlas – rubbing her eyes, twice, thrice, twice again – had honestly thought she’d seen it move a moment. She remained stationary in the water a second, well aware she really needed to get a move on but her soul warned her to halt her movements, told her to wait for it to wade by. Whatever it was.

Unfortunately, no matter how still she remained, it had noticed her, it had seen her and suddenly the patch of seaweed in front of her was moving, morphing and gliding, its speed picking up as it, first, distanced itself before rising and spinning to look at Atlas. It was a Kelpie. A shapeshifting water demon and apparently – by the looks of its voracious eyes – it had named Atlas its next meal.

Atlas shifted and swam the opposite direction, fumbling for her wand at her thigh as she spun on her back and aimed it upon the beast of green, “Incarcer–!”

It collided with her, wrapping its seaweed flippers around her abdomen as it swam, bashing her against floating logs and stray rocks. She covered her head as she burst through a rotting and sunken fishing boat and she was sure, if it was what she was relying on at that moment, the air would have been knocked from her lungs.

The Kelpie shifted and looked at her, hoping to find her unconscious but instead, Atlas was raising her wand again but this time, she pointed it at herself. “Relashio!”

Boiling water fried the seaweed around her and the Kelpie shifted, now adopting a more serpentine look, compared to its previous friendly horse shell. Atlas grinned through gritted and nervous teeth but watched in surprise as it faltered, turning to swim a different way in apparent fright. Atlas observed it go in confusion, before a sudden tug pulled at the back of her head. She turned to see a shark with the body of a boy swimming right toward her, a large tentacle reaching out to wrap around his legs.

“Krum!?” Atlas yelled and the panic in the boy’s eyes when he was suddenly sucked backwards made any resentment the girl may have had for the guy disappear. She swam after him, “Idiot! Didn’t you know the Giant Squid likes shark!?” Even if she was saving him, it didn’t mean she couldn’t verbally assault him in the meantime.

She managed to swim ahead, gulping down whatever was in her mouth at the monstrous sight of the ridiculously large beak belonging to the Giant Squid. Now, usually, she really liked the Squid, he was friendly, waved at her and helped her find things for little side projects she wanted to make but right now, right now she felt a little faint. Rightly so, its mouth was double the size of her and could swallow both her and Krum whole.

One of its large eyes swivelled to look at her and they lightened up in recognition, its mouth closed and was suddenly hidden from view. Still, a half-transfigured Krum was barely conscious, being swung around idly in the Squid’s grasp. Atlas glanced over to him nervously and then back to the Squid. She was running out of time, she was running out of valuable time. Trust Krum to be uneducated in the inhabitants of the Lake. Merlin, she wanted to punch him, Ginny was waiting for her and Hermione was waiting for him, but doing that now wouldn’t be the smartest idea.

“He’s not a shark!” Atlas found herself shouting, her eyes shifting to their unnatural gold. The Squid looked at her, then looked at Krum, dragging him so he was directly in front of his eyes.

“He looks like one.“

“Yes well, he’s not! He’s clearly half boy!”

“Can I have the part that’s not half boy?“

“No!” Atlas shouted, frustrated bubbles expelling from her mouth. She looked down at her watch, finding it cracked and unmoving. Great, the Kelpie had doomed her without having to suffocate her. “Give him back! He’s a Champion from Durmstrang! As well as one of the most famous Seekers in the world!”

“Fine dining…“

“Hey! Drop him already, please! I have to save my friends from the Merpeople!”

“The Merpeople you say?“

“Yes! They have my friends.”

“If that’s the case…” The Giant Squid slowly dropped Krum from his grasp and Atlas quickly swam over to him, catching the boy before he sunk deeper into the abyss beneath them. She struggled a moment and then panicked when she saw a cloud of blood forming before her. “You’re right…his blood doesn’t smell like a shark at all.“

“You stabbed him!”

“And in return, you’ll stab some Merpeople for me, they’re to the South.“

“What!?” Atlas exclaimed but then shook her head, moving so Krum hung over her shoulder. “Whatever! I’m going!”

“Bring me a cow later.“

Atlas propelled herself through the lake, head popping out of the water as she looked around and spotted her desired bank in the distance. She could hear the stands going wild, obviously thinking she’d already gotten her hostage but no, she’d had to go and be all heroic. Quickly as she could as to not waste any more time, Atlas swam over to where she saw Dumbledore approaching the shore and dragged Krum behind her, standing and stumbling to the rocks. The flippers made it incredibly hard and the injuries in her legs from the Kelpie made it hard to stand in general.

“He swam into the Giant Squid dressed as a stupid shark,” Atlas rushed, chest heaving as she suddenly found difficulty in breathing. Madam Pomfrey came running forward, face pale as she didn’t hesitate to wade further into the water, lifting up Krum’s shirt to view the wound beneath. It was deep, no doubt caused by one of the razor-sharp claws the Squid had lining its tentacles. “How long do I have?”

“Half an hour,” Bella yelled, running over to help Pomfrey pull the Bulgarian Seeker from the water. Atlas nodded and jumped back into the lake, taking off quicker now that she didn’t have doubt of where to go and the weight of Krum slowing her down. She turned to the South, diving down, deep, into the concealed depths, carefully eyeing the weed beneath her. Kelpies were a horrible threat to deal with but the weed also hid something else, something that had a far greater number.

She spotted one just ahead, eyes glinting as it watched her swim overhead.

A Grindylow.

Atlas made sure to keep it in her peripheral watching its every move until she made it over the plain of high weed and happened upon expanses of black mud, bubbling with substances Atlas didn’t even want to know the origins of. The muddy waters cleared and Atlas couldn’t help but grin when evidence of civilisation appeared through the water. High walls, decorated and adorned with murals depicting historical events, Merpeople, Grindylows and even the odd Giant Squid painting. Though those depicted the Merpeople chasing the poor thing. No wonder he’d wanted Atlas to stab a few of the locals.

“An hour-long you’ll have to look,
And to recover what we took…
Your time’s almost gone, so tarry not,
Lest what you seek stays here to rot…”

Atlas swam past the images, following the mersong deeper and deeper until she came across faces. Faces she knew to be Merpeople with their greyish skin and long, floating, dark green hair. Their eyes were yellow, nothing like Atlas’s that shimmered a gorgeous gold, but the type of yellow that sent shivers down Atlas’s spine. She turned away from them and didn’t listen to their whispers as she passed, instead, focusing on what she saw at the centre of it all. A place that resembled a sunken version of Hogsmeade’s town square.

The song grew louder here and Atlas sped up, spotting a familiar figure by the three remaining floating bodies. It seemed Fleur had already been and gone with Roger Davies, or whoever her hostage was.

“Harry!” She called and the boy turned to her, the green rope he had been cutting snapping finally in his palm as he did. Ron’s body floated up with the bubbles that poured from his slightly ajar mouth but Harry caught him before he could float up any further. “Fleur’s been?”

He nodded.

“Good, you get going then, I’ll be with you soon,” she said, glancing over at the pale faces of Ginny and Hermione. Harry hesitated before nodding and swimming back the way Atlas had come. She pulled out her wand again and pointed it at Ginny’s bindings, feeling the way the Merpeople eyed her cautiously, practically sensing how they turned their tridents upon her. It seemed Atlas wasn’t supposed to be taking two, it seemed she could only take one.

Atlas, however, simply didn’t give a shit.

The angle of her wand shifted so its trajectory lined up with both of their ropes and with an unnoticeable flourish to her wrist, she sent a severing charm through the water, forming a sort of blade that carried through the ropes of both girls. The Merpeople shrieked, advancing on her but she quickly turned, eyes deadly and daring with her wand raised, teeth gritted and whole demeanour threatening.

Everything about her sent fear down their spines and they heeded the warning, backing away and lowering their weapons. Atlas wasted no more time and hooked Ginny’s arm around her shoulder, grabbing Hermione around the waist as she swam upward and in the direction of the shore. However, her legs ached, the muscles within them screaming at her in white-hot pain, the adrenaline from before had long since worn off and the injuries she’d sustained from the Kelpie were returning to stab her in the back. Not only that, but she could feel the effects of the Gillyweed fading.

Gills turned back to smooth skin, flippers back to feet and lungs resuming their need for fresh, wonderful oxygen. She was so close yet so far. Atlas could see where the shallows met the sudden trench just in the distance and pushed herself, feeling a burning need for air rise within her, the light of day highlighted her way but it also highlighted other things, other things that were otherwise disguised in the weed below, or rather, were disguised as the weed below.

The Godric-be-damned Kelpie. In a flourish of panic, Atlas pushed the bodies of Hermione and Ginny ahead of her so their heads breached the water and their feet touched the slimy rocks of the shallows, but doing this pushed her further away. Which was both a good thing and a bad thing. The Kelpie narrowly missed her, shooting out of the water and returning just behind her. Atlas made for her wand again, shooting shot after shot in its direction, but she was no longer swift in the water, her lack of webbed hands and feet made her movements sluggish.

A tendril of its Kelpie body lept out to grab her and in the sudden action, the air – this time – was knocked from her lungs. The remnants and bubbles of it rising to the surface where she needed to be. It dragged her down, further into the depths, intending to drown her, intending to fulfil the killing method it was known for. Her eyes grew heavy, the last scraps of oxygen extinguishing.

She could feel the water fill her lungs, suffocating her, burning her from the inside out. She tried to stop herself from taking any more in but her brain disobeyed her, gasping for the oxygen within the water but it was null, there was nothing and that instilled panic within the primal part of her. However, her body gave out, she wanted to fight but she was just so exhausted, so spent. She had no choice but to be dragged down into the depths as the edges of her vision grew blurry and her chest adopted a feeling of solidity.

That’s what she felt. What she felt at first but then something kicked her, something spurred her eyes open, filled her with something that did not weigh as heavy as the brick in her chest. Her eyes blew open and she turned to look upon the face of the Kelpie, its form now grotesque and demonic. She shifted. Shifted so that her form as a Dire-wolf outgrew the bindings of the Kelpie, she swivelled around, biting down, hard, through the water-demons body and then swam, her large paws melting back into their human form as she kicked desperately at the water, pulled herself urgently through the heavy static surrounding her.

The darkness thinned above, she could see the daylight, could see the shallows appearing once more. She clawed her way over to them, almost letting go of the breath she’d been so graciously gifted in her time of need out of relief when her foot hit a slimy stone. She walked along them, her head breaking through the surface and she gasped for a breath, panting and coughing, almost sobbing but definitely shaking as she waded her way to the shore.

Cheers sounded over in the stands but Atlas couldn’t care any less, she was just thankful, so bloody thankful she could breathe again. Bella rushed into the water to meet her, grabbing her up in a hug and dragging her over to dry land where towels and warmth awaited her. She almost collapsed when the weight of her body was returned to her, the injuries she had sustained to her legs the reason as to why she was having such difficulty standing.

“Atlas! Atlas oh Merlin! Merlin, I thought you wouldn’t — you wouldn’t–!”

“Bella…” Atlas interrupted hoarsely, face quite pale as she shook. “Please — please don’t.”

“Alright, ok,” Bella nodded instantly, guiding her over to Madam Pomfrey who looked just as shaken as she. The nurse took up the other side of Atlas, helping her walk over to where the rest of the Champions, as well as their hostages, were, bundled and shivering.

“Come here, sweetheart,” Madam Pomfrey ushered, pouring a vial of very hot potion down her throat. She winced as it went down, feeling as steam gushed out of her ears and how her throat suddenly cleared, allowing easier breaths to her lungs. She sighed out in relief, collapsing onto one of the makeshift beds and looking down at her battered legs. First her arms and now her lower half, what next, her chest? Head? Merlin, she was so over this tournament.

“Atlas!” Atlas only just managed to turn halfway when a body suddenly collapsed with hers, Hermione almost sending the both of them toppling off of the bed in her sudden and strong attack of affection. “Atlas, you — Atlas!” Was all she shouted and suddenly she was kissing her all over, her cheeks, her nose, her forehead even her eyebrows but never her lips. That would be too far.

“Miss Granger, please calm yourself,” Madam Pomfrey said, though there was an amused smile on her lips. Hermione flushed and immediately stopped, still hugging Atlas but now in a way that was actually suitable to the public. Atlas simply smiled, rubbing where Hermione had kissed her cheek last.

“Atlas!” Atlas was now bombarded with another girl, Ginny Weasley came bounding over to her, flinging her own damp towel over Atlas head and trying valiantly to dry her hair as she grinned widely. “You’re so fucking cool.”

“Ginny!” Hermione scolded as Atlas laughed.

“Thanks, Ginny,” She smiled. “Did you get to the shore ok?”

“Yeah, Hermione helped me swim,” Ginny shrugged and then smirked, sitting beside her. “So, I’m your most treasure person?”

“No, that’s Hermione,” Atlas said naturally, missing the way the girl buried her face further into her towel. “Then Harry, Ron, Cedric, Bella, Fleur–“

“Ok, I get it! I know! I was already told!”

“Hey, you were next on the list,” Atlas chided, nudging her shoulder with a weak fist. Ginny simply smiled, looking up when a few more figures came over to join them. Harry and Ron were soaked, red in the face and shivering but grinning, all the same. The redhead took the spot beside his sister while Harry sat next to Hermione, leaning forward to catch Atlas’s eye. “Hey, boy-wonder.”

“What took you so long?”

“Kelpie,” Atlas grimaced and while Harry nodded – with a hint of confusion because he clearly didn’t know what that was – Hermione, Ron and Ginny all looked quite concerned, the three of them looking between each other in mutual understanding. “What?” Atlas looked between them also, brows furrowed. “Did I miss something?”

“The Kelpie’s were moved, Atty. There’s not supposed to be any around the trial area, Dumbledore told us so himself, before we were put under,” Hermione told and though Atlas did feel slightly unnerved by this fact, she simply shrugged it off and laughed nervously.

“Maybe one didn’t get the memo?” She smiled, though it looked a little crooked, it slowly dropped to a frown though when Atlas spotted a face she hadn’t seen in a very long time, a face that had – though still very youthful – morphed into a version that was a lot less babyish. “Gabrielle? Why is she here?”

“Gabrielle? Oh, Fleur’s sister?” Ginny asked, “she was Fleur’s most treasured person.”

“Yeah but…she’s a kid,” Atlas said, looking entirely disapproving, “She’s like…eleven.”

“When we saw her in McGonagall’s office, we said the same thing,” Ron said, sniffling and wiping his dripping wet nose with his towel, the girls nodded in agreement and Atlas ran a hand through her hair nervously, finding that it was no longer tied up. The hairband must have slid off in the lake and Atlas idly sent a message to her morning self, thanking her dearly for not wearing Sirius’s present. “It’s a bit wrong, isn’t it? Putting a kid that young down under.”

“It’s wrong, full-stop,” Hermione said, puffing up as some leftover steam blasted from her ears, Atlas noticed it and smiled amusedly as she nodded in agreement. The Trials were very wrong, kind of sadistic in general. It was strange how people found watching kids in life-threatening situations fun but that was the wizarding world, it was brutal, because though magic is amazing, it’s wonderous, gorgeous and so very light, the darkness can crawl out from the shadows and overrule that with little to no effort. “Ginny can’t swim and yet they insisted she went under as well.”

“Was there nobody else?” Harry asked.

“Well, Bella wasn’t in the country yet and the spell wouldn’t work on Cedric because he was injured,” Ginny told, glancing to the lake nervously as she shivered and pulled a face of discontent. “I had no choice really, McGonagall ended up volunteering but I didn’t want to have some elderly lady risk her health for me.”

“McGonagall is a very stubborn woman, Ginny,” Atlas said but then smiled, hooking an arm around the redhead’s shoulder. “But thanks, for doing that for her…yes, she’s stubborn but as you said, she is also old. Old people are fragile.”

“Don’t let her catch you saying that, mate,” Ron grinned. “She’ll turn you into a tea-cosy.”

“Hey, what’s Dumbledore doing?” Harry questioned, a tint of amusement in his voice as he motioned over to where Dumbledore was, crouching at the water’s edge, screeching in the face of the chief Merperson, a wild and ferocious-looking woman. Ginny snorted, Ron chuckling as well while Harry grinned, entirely entertained and Hermione rolled her eyes, resting her head against Atlas’s shoulder. Atlas herself was trying to translate but her Mermish was rusty and she only caught a few basic words, finding out it was about Harry and her.

Finally, Dumbledore straightened, turning to his fellow judges. “A conference before we give the marks, I think.”

“They were talking about us,” Atlas said.

“You could understand them?” Ginny grinned.

“I’m a woman of many talents…many unpolished talents, but talents nonetheless,” Atlas remarked. “Apparently Harry got to the site first and well, they’re talking about the Kelpie. Is it really that big of a deal?”

“Well, yeah, mate,” Ron nodded, glancing to Hermione and Ginny. “Even though they’re Quadruple X class and are like, less dangerous than Dragons. Dumbledore decided they should be moved. There’s no specialist on the scene to help you down there, only the Merfolk and they wouldn’t dare approach a bloody Kelpie.”

“Not just that but they moved them because of us,” Hermione added, “Kelpies are known to lurk around the Mer-village, if they caught our scent they might’ve hunted us and the Merpeople wouldn’t have been able to stop them.”

“Why did one get Atlas then?” Harry said.

“That’s probably the problem, one shouldn’t have gotten Atlas. They were really thorough, moving them all further East, past the Giant Squid,” Ginny said this time. “Dumbledore kept reassuring us of how many times they’d swept the area. It was one of the reasons I actually agreed, in the end. There was no Kelpie, well, there wasn’t supposed to be…”

“So…what? Did someone sneak one in? Without anybody noticing? Who?” Harry said and Atlas furrowed her brows, looking deep into the rocks under her feet as she felt Hermione tense beside her, for the exact same reason Atlas had frozen.

The Monster, it had been in the area recently, very recently, is that what it had been doing? It was the only logical explanation. Or could it all be a diversion? Atlas didn’t know why but she wanted to give some support for that theory. She couldn’t rule anything out. Not with everything Harry had been saying as well, with Crouch and Moody snooping through Snape’s stuff. With Karkaroff being an Ex-Death Eater. Was it all linked? It had to be, it just had to be.

“Atlas…” Hermione whispered but Atlas shook her head.

“Don’t say it.”

“…ok.”

“Ladies and gentlemen, we have reached our decision,” Ludo suddenly boomed and the five of them jumped, looking over at him. “Merchieftainess Murcus has told us exactly what happened at the bottom of the lake, and we have therefore decided to award marks out of fifty for each of the champions, as follows…

“Fleur Delacour, who demonstrated excellent use of the Bubble-Head Charm, was first to return with her hostage, five minutes before the time limit of an hour,” Atlas smiled and clapped, the gesture drowned out by the shrieks and cries, applause and cheers from the stands across the lake. Nevertheless, Fleur saw and smiled at her in thanks, bowing to whisper something in Gabrielle’s ear. “We, therefore, award her forty-seven points!”

The little girl’s gaze snapped over to her and Atlas smiled, offering her a sweet wave. However, before she knew it, the girl was hopping down from Fleur’s lap and quickly sprinting across the stones, Atlas’s eyes grew steadily wider and she hurriedly opened her arms to receive Gabrielle’s flying hug.

“Atlas!”

“Hello, Gabrielle,” Atlas grinned, turning her cheek to accept the little kiss Gabrielle gave her. “My you’ve grown!” she said, holding the eleven year old high up in the air. She was quite petite, just like Fleur had been when they’d met. “How old are you now? Hmm, 15? 16?”

“J’ai onze ans!” Gabrielle giggled out in protest and Atlas smiled, setting her back down on the rocks to pinch her cheek.

“Eleven, really? You’re already so big, keep it up and you’ll be like me,” Atlas puffed up her cheeks and held her arms out wide, displaying her impressive arm span and height. Gabrielle laughed again, glancing at the curious eyes staring at her, she now, suddenly looked quite nervous and moved forward, hiding her face in Atlas’s chest speedily. “Don’t worry, these are my friends.”

“Hi, I’m Harry,” Harry greeted kindly.

“My name’s Ginny,” Ginny punched her brother, urging him to introduce himself as well.

“Ouch, Gin — Oh…I’m Ron.”

“And I’m Hermione,” Hermione smiled and Gabrielle looked at her the longest, glancing over her shoulder to Fleur who nodded encouragingly before turning back to Atlas and pointing boldly at Hermione’s form.

“C’est elle que tu appelles magnifique?“

“…you know what?” Atlas flushed, smiling nervously. “Gabrielle, how about you go back to your sister? Madam Pomfrey wouldn’t want you walking around and she can get feisty when her patients don’t listen to her. Ok?”

“D’accord,” Gabrielle shrugged indifferently, turning and skipping over to a smirking Fleur. Atlas mouthed a threat in her general direction and the French-Woman laughed, resuming the drying of her hair while Bagman carried on with his announcements.

“What was that about?” Ginny asked.

“Oh, nothing to…” Atlas’s stomach did a funny flip. “worry about…” because Hermione was blushing. “Hey, Mi…by any chance, do you know French?”

“A little…”

“Ah…”

“Viktor Krum used an incomplete form of Transfiguration but was unfortunately apprehended by the Giant Squid and failed to retrieve his hostage,” Atlas glanced over to the boy, finding his brooding form sat over by Karkaroff, a bandaged wrapped around his waist. He turned and they stared at each other, however, she was surprised to see him smile, nodding in what looked like begrudging respect. “We award him, twenty-five points.”

Karkaroff, however, did not share the boy’s acceptance of defeat and instead, glared dangerously in Atlas’s direction in a way that could only be described as savagely threatening. Atlas felt a chill run down her spine but returned the glare nonetheless, not willing to back down. She’d just saved his student yet he looked as if she’d left him to die.

“Harry Potter used Gillyweed to great effect,” Bagman continued. “He returned second, three minutes out of the hour time limit. However, the Merchieftainess informs us that Mr Potter was first to reach the hostages and that the delay in his return was due to his determination to make sure every hostage would be saved,” Atlas tore her gaze away from Karkaroff and looked over at Harry, grinning disbelievingly, muttering ‘idiot’ under her breath as he flushed. “We, therefore, award him 45 points for his moral fibre!”

“There we go, Harry! You’re in the lead,” Atlas cheered, leaning over Hermione to pat the boy heartily on the back.

“Now, Atlas Magianima also used Gillyweed to great effect,” Ludo beamed, sending a wink in the girl’s direction. “She returned last and well outside the time limit of an hour, but it’s come to our attention, Atlas was unfairly challenged by a beast that should not be roaming the Trial area at this time, which will be investigated further at a later date. Furthermore, Miss Magianima also sacrificed a large chunk of her time to save Mr Krum from the Giant Squid and retrieved his hostage in his steed.”

“I wasn’t very well about to leave him for dead,” Atlas grumbled when Harry shot her the same look she had, him.

“Most of the judges,” — Bagman gave Karkaroff a very nasty look — “feel that this shows moral fibre also, and merits full marks. However…Miss Magianima’s score is forty-three points.”

“Oh…” Atlas mused, eyes slightly wide.

“Moral fibre…” Ginny mocked under her breath with a large disbelieving smile and Atlas – though gifted with greater hearing – almost hadn’t caught it over the monumental applause across the lake. Harry and Ron whistled wildly while Hermione laughed softly, clapping as well.

“The Potter-Black God-siblings and their Moral Fibre,” Ron whooped and the god-siblings shared a smile.

“The third and final task will take place at dusk on the twenty-fourth of June,” continued Bagman. “The champions will be notified of what is coming precisely one month beforehand. Thank you all for your support of the champions.”

It was over, Atlas had done it and in that moment she jumped to her feet, intent on running for her dorm room and sleeping for all of eternity, however, she’d forgotten one crucial thing. She couldn’t walk. So, instead of sprinting, she fell flat on her face.

“Atlas!”