CHAPTER FORTY-ONE;

THE THIRD TASK, part one

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

"No, you've got it wrong, Harry, look–" Cassie broke off and exemplified the wrist movement, slowly so he could see every aspect. "Not.. whatever you've been doing."

   "This is pointless," Harry groaned, dropping his wand onto the desk, his head following with a thud. "I'm never going to be able to do the Stunning Spell."

   "Cheer up, Harry," said Cassie with a soft smile, rubbing his back soothingly. "We've got loads more time to prepare, and even Moody's on your side, mate–!"

   "What's the point of the Stunning Spell?" Harry queried suddenly, picking his head up.

   "Um.. to stun people, maybe?"

   "No, I mean–" he groaned again. "I mean, why should I learn it? I haven't even got half a chance against Krum, Fleur, and Diggory. I might as well drop out now."

   Cassie frowned. It was especially out of character of Harry to be so negative, so doubting of his own abilities. She watched him for a moment.

"Stun me," she instructed, standing from the desk and moving across the empty classroom. "C'mon, Harry, Stun me." She began tossing harmless jinxes and hexes his way, a few striking him across the cheek, over the shoulder, on the leg.

"I'm not going to Stun you," he said irritably, barely sparing her a glance as she rushed about the classroom, "so you can stop embarrassing yourself."

"You think I'm embarrassing myself? No, no, Harry, you've got it twisted," said Cassie, smiling. She cast a small slicing hex that cut him straight across his cheekbone – barely a bead of blood dripped down his face. Cassie watched as he screwed up his face, still shooting hexes at him. She grazed his chin with another cut. "Seems to be the other way round, mate."

He stood suddenly and hit her with a very strong "Stupefy!" that sent her falling backwards and into the precautionary cushions that had been set earlier, unconscious. In an instant, his face dropped and he rushed to her side to perform the Enervate charm.

She awoke with a cough, the air being forced from her lungs. "Merlin, Harry," she choked, "I'd no idea I make you that angry."

"You sliced my face!" he retorted, grabbing her by her outstretched hand to pull her to a seated position. She laughed.

"I had to make you feel threatened," she reasoned with a smile, though her face fell as she scanned his slight injuries. "D'you mind if I...? I know some– er, a few basic healing spells, but if you want to go see Madam Pomfrey–"

"No, I'd rather not," he said quickly. Both teenagers were blissfully unaware of the lack of distance between them, and Cassie leaned in, her wand raised to the cuts adorning his cheek. She cleared her throat.

"Episkey," Cassie whispered, her brow knitted together in focus as she trailed the tip of her wand over the cuts, a small string of white light exuding from the maple end. Harry's green eyes were glued to her as she worked. Their eyes caught, and her breath hitched for a moment. Well.. what did she have to lose?

    "Harry.." she began, very slowly.

    "Cassie..?"

Now or never, she thought.

    "Ilikeyou," she said quickly, shocking even herself at her courage. A loud voice in the back of her head told her to shut up before she embarrassed herself, but alas, she went on. "Like.. a lot. I– I mean.. I fancy you. I do."

   Harry stared at her with wide eyes. His cheeks flushed a deep shade of red and he had fallen speechless for a moment, before he cleared his throat.

"Cass–"

"No, don't say anything," she blurted, white across the face. "Don't– just.. don't– I'm sorry–"

"No, I'm sorry," he insisted, shaking his head fervently. "I– I should've specified–about asking you to the ball; I only meant as.. as friends."

As friends. Of course he'd asked her as friends, what else would they have gone as? Boyfriend and girlfriend? Romantic interests? Significant others? Apparently, in Harry's eyes, Cassie was nothing more than a– a pal. He shared none of her feelings.

Her insides burned with multiple overwhelming emotions – bitterness, grief, embarrassment. She was sure her blood was quite literally boiling, though all she did on the outside was purse her lips together and nod shortly. She mustered up a smile.

And, to add a final crush to the pain of her own heart, Cassie said, "As friends, of course. Disregard... just forget it, I suppose."

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Cassie was not an idiot; she knew Harry had told Ron and Hermione about what had happened. They couldn't have made it more obvious – the constant shocked stares, the hushed whisperings as she rose from the lunch table, the vehement glancing between her and Harry in the common room. So, Cassie did the only logical response to these reactions that she had thought of –

   She kept distance. Lots of distance. From all three of her friends.

   Hermione, in the beginning, had attempted to invite Cassie to sit with her, Ron, and Harry at meals or in classes, but Cassie politely declined without so much a glance towards Harry. Eventually, Hermione had understood that she was fighting a losing battle, and just gave up on inviting Cassie.

   It was not as though Cassie were totally alone – she had Atticus, and she had Cedric, though never both at the same time. She had Luna and Neville, even if she could barely hold her eyes open when Neville went on his daily spurts about his plants. And she even had Wipsy – though this was partly untrue, as Wipsy was a house-elf.

As the third and final task drew nearer and nearer, Cassie found herself further from Harry than she'd ever intended to happen. From an outsider's perspective, one would even think that Harry and Cassie had never as much as even spoken to each other, much less been best friends.

This proved particularly troublesome when Harry collapsed on the floor of the Divination classroom and began to seize, clutching his forehead painfully, and Cassie couldn't rush to his aid like she would've only a week prior.

Cassie attempted to get as much information through the rumors and gossip being passed around as she could, though a nagging voice constantly told her that this was immoral and she knew it couldn't have been true, but it wasn't as though she could waltz up to Harry and ask what he'd seen anymore.

   That advantage died in the empty Transfiguration classroom.

   However, Cassie could not help but perk up her ears when she heard Malfoy's taunting that day. They had been sitting in the Great Hall for breakfast – well, Harry, Ron, and Hermione had been together. Cassie still sat near the end of the table with Neville.

   "Hey Potter! Potter! How's your head? You feeling all right? Sure you're not going berserk on us?" the platinum blond yelled across the Hall, snickering with his familiar band of baboons. Theodore Nott sat to the side, and to his credit, was not showing Malfoy a bit of attention.

   Cassie glanced over to where two Gryffindors, a second year and a third year, were poring over the newest edition of the Daily Prophet. She leaned over and peered over their shoulders for a moment, her eyes widening slightly. She mumbled a "Can I see this?" then took the paper without waiting for a reply.

   Harry Potter
"Disturbed and Dangerous"
The boy who defeated He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Names is unstable and possibly dangerous, writes Rita Skeeter, Special Correspondent. Alarming evidence has recently come to light about Harry Potter's strange behavior, which casts doubts upon his suitability to compete in a demanding competition like the Triwizard Tournament, or even to attend Hogwarts School.

Potter, we can exclusively reveal, regularly collapses at school, and is often heard to complain of pain in the scar on his forehead (relic of the curse with which You-Know-Who attempted to kill him). On Monday last, midway through a Divination lesson, your Daily Prophet reporter witnessed Potter storming from the class, claiming that his scar was aching too badly to continue studying.

The article continued for nearly six more paragraphs, going on and on about the damning evidence that Dumbledore had gone senile and Harry was a crazed, attention-seeking orphan.

   Cassie looked up just as Hermione dashed out of the Great Hall, looking quite victorious. She quirked an eyebrow and followed Hermione with her eyes curiously. As Hermione exited the Hall, Mcgonagall entered hurriedly and rushed over to where Harry sat. She told him something very quickly, then rushed off. A moment later, Harry stood and followed her, Cedric, Fleur, and Viktor on his tail.

   "Spill."

   Cassie nearly did just that with her pumpkin juice as Ron's face appeared out of nowhere, right in front of her. She choked on the drink and sputtered for a moment, all the while being stared down by the redhead.

   When she finished her coughing, she looked back to him. "What?"

   "You heard me, mate!" Ron demanded, absently handing her a napkin to dab at her robes with. "I want to know what happened. Spill."

"I've no clue what you're on about," she said with a huff, standing and gathering her books. "C'mon then, we've got to get to our History of Magic exam."

Ron followed her out of the Hall, up the grand staircase, and down the corridor leading to Professor Binns's classroom silently. She finally turned to face him right outside the classroom door, her brow furrowed in frustration.

"You're not going to stop doing this until I tell you, are you?" she quirked an eyebrow, then rolled her eyes at his nod. "Fine. I told him.. I fancy him. That's it."

She spun on her heel and entered the exam room, sitting in her seat and ignoring Ron, who followed her to her spot and was spewing out questions like a geyser.

"Mister Weasley!" called the dull voice of Professor Binns. "Your seat, so we may begin the exam, please."

Ron begrudgingly sat in his own seat, glaring at the ghost with resentment. Cassie stifled a laugh at his anger and turned to face the front of the classroom.

"Now," said Professor Binns, "to begin with the exam..."

It went well; Cassie's unending revising had paid off, it appeared. The only downside was the fact that she could feel Ron's glare burning into her head for the entirety of the exam.

"Honestly, Ron," she chastised as they walked to the common room, "I've no idea how you managed to finish the exam within the limit, what with all of the time you spent glaring daggers at my head."

"You better finish telling me what happened, or I'll–"

"You'll sic Pigwidgeon on me? Fat chance," she snorted, shaking her head and climbing through the portrait hole. Hermione was pacing back and forth across the carpet, holding her hand up to her mouth and muttering into it and running her hand through her hair continually. Cassie and Ron shared a bemused look.

"Hermione?"

"Oh, hello," she said absentmindedly. Cassie exhaled deeply and collapsed onto the couch behind her, finally able to relax in the warmth of the common room without Harry sitting in the opposite couch for once.

"The task's starting soon," said Hermione a few minutes later, now sitting on the ground and revising instead of pacing.

"Alright," was all Cassie said, her head hanging upside down over the arm of the couch. She was busying herself with attempting to braid her hair whilst upside down.

Hermione cleared her throat pointedly. Cassie picked her head up and raised an eyebrow. "Well.. I'd've thought you wanted to go wish Cedric good luck," she said, tilting her head to the side slightly.

Feeling very much like Hermione only wanted to speak with Ron alone, a dejected Cassie exited the portrait hole and began walking to the Hufflepuff common room. She ran into Professors Mcgonagall, Flitwick, Hagrid, and Moody on the way, all four rushing in the same direction.

"Cass!" a voice called from behind her. She turned, already grinning at the familiar voice, and broke into a laugh as her eyes landed on Cedric Diggory. He greeted her with a hug, burying her face in his chest.

"Dad, you know Cassidy," he said to Amos Diggory, who gave her a thin-lipped smile and pitiful handshake. Cedric turned to the woman standing on the other side of his father. "Mum, this is Cassie."

Cedric's mother grinned and extended a hand to the girl, then shook it excitedly. Cassie beamed back at the woman. "It's nice to meet you," she said politely.

"And you, the same!" Mrs. Diggory said happily, stepping back and wrapping an arm around Cedric's shoulders. "I can't thank you enough for watching over our son while he's at school – who knows what trouble he'd be getting into without you to stop him!" She laughed heartily and shook her head. "Only joking... Anyway, Ced's giving us a tour of the grounds."

"That's lovely," said Cassie, her cheeks growing tired of the wide grin on her face. "I've only come to wish him good luck on the third task."

"Our boy doesn't need luck," said Mr. Diggory proudly, slapping his son on the back. "He's a brilliant wizard, with or without it!"

"Right," said Cassie, barely able to stifle her laugh at Cedric's red cheeks. "I best be going, then. See you after the task, Cedric, you'll do great." She reached up and hugged him around the neck again, then hurried off down the hall to meet Ron and Hermione on their way to the Quidditch pitch.

The pitch – if you could call it that anymore, as the six-foot hedge maze in the center sort of took away from the 'pitch' aspect – was decked out in all sorts of merchandise; Durmstrang, Beauxbatons, Gryffindor and Hufflepuff. Cassie and her friends took their seats and waited impatiently for the task to begin. Finally, after what felt like hours, Dumbledore and Mr. Bagman walked onto the pitch.

"Ladies and gentlemen, the third and final task of the Triwizard Tournament is about to begin! Let me remind you how the points currently stand! Tied in first place, with eighty-five points each – Mr. Cedric Diggory and Mr. Harry Potter, both of Hogwarts school!" There were loud cheers and applause. "In second place, with eighty points – Mr. Viktor Krum, of Durmstrang Institute!" More cheers. "And in third place – Miss Fleur Delacour, of Beauxbatons Academy!

"So, on my whistle, Harry and Cedric!" said Bagman brightly, turning to the champions. "Three – two – one!"

   The tweet of a whistle.

As the two boys burst into the maze, Cassie felt a rough tap on her shoulder. She spun to see Professor Moody, his scarred face looking scarier than ever in the firelight. As she turned, Moody leaned in and lowered his voice so only she could hear him over the cheering.

"Come with me, Black, if you want your friend to make it out of there alive."