Midnight Visits- A Drarry Fanfic

the second task

       The echo of the enchanted megaphone could be heard everywhere throughout the castle, but it seemed to be loudest in the boys' fourth-year Gryffindor dorm, much to Harry's annoyance, but once the memories started to flood in, horror flooded through his veins. But he was correct, it was indeed the second task nearly starting. His given swimsuit was a little wrinkled, but it would have to do. On an empty stomach, Harry ran down multiple flights of stone stairs and through uncut grass paths to the Great Lake where a spectator's tower stood.

        "Harry! Where have you been?" Hermione adjusted his glasses and spun him around.

        "Well, I think he just oversle-"

       "Yes, Ronald I-" He cut her off with a sloppy peck that was half on her lower lip and half on her chin, tickling her pink. Harry rolled his eyes and smiled sarcastically at the young couple. 

       "You guys, come on, where's Draco? I need to talk to him." Hermione's blush faded by a tone as she her chocolate eyes bore into his emerald ones.

        "No one's seen him at all, it seems. He's disappeared. But never mind, you need to be on the podium with the rest of the champions!" Harry ran across the dock near the platform as he was delayed yet again by a small, bat-eared figured he'd come to know as Dobby. 

       "Dobby has offered Harry Potter some Gillyweed to hold his breath!" 

      "D-Dobby! Why are you-" But with a crack, the elf disappeared. Harry ran to the podium, wobbling a bit to avoid falling into the lake water. Cedric gave him an unreadable look from a foot above (He was quite tall). 

       "Now that we have our final champion, it's time to begin!" Harry shoved the slimy, snakish weed down his throat, sending a searing pain to his throat.

       "GO!" The clock started to tick as the others gracefully dove into the water, but Harry simply fell, clutching the side of his throat. 

       The lake was icy and unforgivingly cold. Underwater was dark and murky, rope-like plants snaked around, going down into the unknown, where do swimmer would dare reach. The searing pain restarted, creating roughness on his skin, thin webs between his fingers and toes, and three precise slits on his neck, letting out the smallest bubbles. Harry had gills. The lake wasn't so black, more like a dark shade of green. As he swam through the hypothermia-inducing water, long, silver fish darted past the weeds. After minutes of just swimming around, squiddish, fanged creatures glided effortlessly around him and wrapped their long nails around him. "RELASHIO!" He released, and felt calm until he heard the song.

        The voice was the same, hauntingly beautiful sound. It was enchanting, coming from a glowing center of rock houses, smoothed and shaped as if they were always there. Shadows whirred around them, casting mysterious imprints. The merpeople had gray-green skins with wild, dark hair and humongous eyes that kept the littlest amount of light. Their spears and tridents looked threatening and sharp. Behind the commercial center he saw were human silhouettes bound by those rope-like plants. 

       Elven, mystical hair flowed around a carbon copy of Fleur, untouched by anyone. A beautiful girl, the girl Viktor had taken to the ball instead of Hermione, after brutally insulting her. Her body was obscured by a half-shark creature Harry had to back away from in fear that human remains would rise to the surface. Harsh raven hair clouded another girl's face, a very pretty one he had once harbored feelings for, one that was now in the arms of an equally handsome boy. A final victim, gaunt and possessed, surrounded by neat, short platinum hair. His face was sunken down. Harry had quite the idea of who was hanging there but was unsure, so he began to blast the ropes. It was likely Fleur would never show up, so he took a rock to the little girl's bindings.

        "Only one," The once beautiful voices turned raspy and grating, but it didn't frighten him at all. One quick incantation, and the merpeople covered in their dwellings, pet grindylows tearing from their leashes to swim away. Harry held the girl's thin waist, afraid to break her, and held the other's hand to drag them up to the glowing surface of the lake. He could feel the gills shrinking, the webs tearing. He rose up, feeling the cool oxygen on his face, getting to finally breathe.

        "It's you," He breathed into the other's face as the girl swam to her older sister, babbling in French. Embracing underwater was quite difficult, but at least no one saw. He'd done it.