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—IT WAS THE DAY OF THE SECOND TASK. The four champions were waiting by the Black lake. Dumbledore smiled at Alexandria, but Karkaroff and Madame Maxime didn't look at all pleased to see her. Alexandria merely rolled her eyes and turned back around.
Ludo Bagman was now moving among the champions, spacing them along the bank at intervals of ten feet.
Alexandria was on the very end of the line, next to Krum, who was wearing swimming trunks, and was holding his wand ready.
"All right, Alexandria?" Bagman whispered, as he moved Alexandria a few feet further away from Krum. "Know what you're going to do?"
"Yeah," nodded the girl.
Bagman gave her shoulder a quick squeeze, and returned to the judges' table; he pointed his wand at his throat as he had done at the World Cup, said "Sonorus!" and his voice boomed out across the dark water towards the stands. "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—"
"Goodluck," whispered Cedric to her.
She merely gave him a nod, not in the mood to talk to anyone.
"—One... two ... three!"
♡
Alexandria swam deeper and deeper, out towards the middle of the lake, staring through the eerily grey-lit water around her to the shadows beyond, where the water became opaque.
Thankfully, she had already known the bubblehead charm, so that's what she used.
Small fish flickered past her like silver darts. Once or twice she thought she saw something larger moving ahead of her, but when she got nearer, she discovered it to be nothing but a large, blackened log, or a dense clump of weed.
There was no sign of any of the other champions, merpeople – nor, thankfully, the giant squid.
Light-green weed stretched ahead of her as far as she could see, two feet deep, like a meadow of very overgrown grass.
Alexandria was staring unblinkingly ahead of her, trying to discern shapes through the gloom... and then, without warning, something grabbed hold of her ankle.
She twisted her body around and saw a Grindylow, a small, horned water demon, poking out of the weeds, its long fingers clutched tightly around Alexandria's leg, its pointed fangs bared –
"Relashio!"
She pulled her ankle out of the Grindylows' grip and swam as fast as she could.
♡
Alexandria swam on for what felt like at least twenty minutes. She was passing over vast expanses of black mud now, which swirled murkily as she disturbed the water.
Then, at long last, she heard a snatch of haunting mer-song.
"An hour long you'll have to look, And to recover what we took.."
Alexandria started to swim faster, and soon saw a large rock emerge out of the muddy water ahead. It had paintings of merpeople on it; they were carrying spears, and chasing what looked like the giant squid. She swam on past the rock, following the mer-song.
"..your time's half-gone, so tarry not Lest what you seek stays here to rot.."
A cluster of crude stone dwellings stained with algae loomed suddenly out of the gloom on all sides.
The merpeople had greyish skins and long, wild, dark green hair. Their eyes were yellow, as were their broken teeth, and they wore thick ropes of pebbles around their necks. They leered at Alexandria as she swam past; one or two of them emerged from their caves to watch her better, their powerful, silver fishtails beating the water, spears clutched in their hands.
She sped on, staring around, and soon the dwellings became more numerous; there were gardens of weed around some of them, and she even saw a pet Grindylow tied to a stake outside one door.
Merpeople were emerging on all sides now, watching her eagerly.
She sped around a corner, and a very strange sight met her eyes.
A whole crowd of merpeople were floating in front of the houses that lined what looked like a mer-version of a village square.
A choir of merpeople were singing in the middle, calling the champions towards them, and behind them rose a crude sort of statue; a gigantic merperson hewn from a boulder.
Four people were bound tightly to the tail of the stone merperson.
Harry Potter was tied between Hermione Granger and a Hufflepuff boy— which Alexandria knew was Cedric's friend.
There was also a girl who looked no older than eight, whose clouds of silvery hair made Alexandria feel sure that she was Fleur Delacour's sister.
All four of them appeared to be in a very deep sleep.
Their heads were lolling onto their shoulders, and fine streams of bubbles kept issuing from their mouths.
Alexandria sped towards the hostages, half expecting the merpeople to lower their spears and charge at her, but they did nothing.
But then the merpeople around her started pointing excitedly over her head. Alexandria looked up and saw Cedric swimming towards them.
She immediately pulled her wand out and pointed it at the rope below Harry's leg, shouting, "Relashio!"
If she was being honest, she didn't even care if Harry drowned— well, maybe just a tiny bit, but only for revenge on Lily and James Potter— but she had to save him, knowing that it would be a marvelous way to manipulate him.
So, technically, Dumbledore's plan to 'manipulate' Alexandria into thinking she cared for her 'brother' fully backfired— and maybe.. maybe the light side would see soon enough.
