The cannon roared, signaling the start of the third task. Harry and Cedric, sharing a final, sportsmanlike nod, plunged into the dark, narrow entrance of the maze. The high, rustling hedges immediately swallowed them, the roar of the crowd dimming to a distant, muffled hum.
The air inside was cool, damp, and unnervingly quiet. The path ahead twisted and turned, cloaked in an eerie, shifting mist. Harry's senses were on high alert, his wand held tightly in his hand, its tip glowing with a soft Lumos. He remembered Ariana's warning: The greatest threat in the maze will be the maze itself.
He moved forward with a caution that bordered on paranoia. He ignored the strange whispers that seemed to come from the hedges, dismissed the fleeting, shadowy shapes he saw at the edge of his vision. Every few yards, he would cast a quick, silent revealing charm, checking for traps.
He encountered a Boggart that transformed into a Dementor, but he dispatched it with a nonverbal Riddikulus, his mind too focused on the real threats to be truly frightened by a phantom. He navigated a patch of enchanted mist that tried to turn him upside down, countering it with a simple orientation charm Hermione had taught him. He was not just surviving; he was methodically dissecting the maze's challenges.
Suddenly, a scream echoed through the labyrinth, sharp and full of pain, followed by a shower of red sparks shooting into the sky—the signal for a champion in trouble. It had come from Fleur's direction. Harry hesitated for a moment, his Gryffindor instincts screaming at him to go and help. But Ariana's voice, cold and logical, echoed in his mind: Your primary objective is not to be a hero to them. It is to survive. He gritted his teeth and pressed on, his own survival paramount.
A few minutes later, he heard another commotion. He saw two figures dueling in a side passage ahead. It was Cedric and a strangely stiff, robotic-looking Viktor Krum. Krum's eyes were glazed over, his movements jerky. He was firing unforgivable-level curses, not to injure, but to subdue.
"He's been Imperiused!" Cedric yelled at Harry.
Harry, seeing Cedric holding his own, made a split-second decision. He fired a stunning spell not at Krum, but at a thick hedge root near his feet. The root writhed and coiled, tripping the Durmstrang champion. As Krum stumbled, Cedric hit him with a full-body-bind curse. Krum toppled over like a statue. Another shower of red sparks went up.
"Thanks, Potter!" Cedric called out, before running down a different path. Two champions were down.
Harry continued on, his heart pounding. The maze was a place of ambush and betrayal. He was nearing the center now; he could feel it. The air was thrumming with the magic of the Triwizard Cup.
He rounded a final corner and saw it. There, in a quiet, starlit clearing, the Triwizard Cup sat on a plinth, glowing with a soft, blue light. It was beautiful, triumphant, and completely unguarded.
But just as he was about to step into the clearing, he saw Cedric get there from another path. Cedric was closer. He reached the cup, his face alight with victory. But before his fingers could touch it, a jet of red light shot out from the hedges. Cedric's eyes rolled back, and he collapsed to the ground, stunned and unconscious.
Harry spun around, his wand raised, but there was no one there. The attacker had vanished.
He was alone. Cedric was incapacitated. The path to the cup was clear.
Ariana's voice was a clarion call in his mind. If you see the Triwizard Cup, and the path is clear, you take it. You do not wait. You do not hesitate.
He ran. He sprinted across the clearing, his eyes fixed on the glowing trophy. He reached the plinth, his hands outstretched. He grabbed the two handles of the cup.
The world dissolved. It was not the sickening lurch of a Portkey he was used to. It was a violent, tearing sensation, a forced Apparition that ripped him from the clearing at Hogwarts. He landed with a hard, painful thud on cold, damp ground. The cup falling to the ground beside him.
The air was thick with the smell of wet earth and decay. He was in a dark, overgrown graveyard, surrounded by ancient, crumbling tombstones. A massive, yew tree loomed over him, and in the distance, he could see the dark shape of a church and a large, stately house on a hill.
He knew, with a sickening certainty, that he was not in Hogwarts anymore.
A short, cloaked figure was moving towards him, carrying a bundled object. A large snake was there and a cauldron as well, but Harry was only looking peripherally. The moment he had landed, Harry's heart hammered against his ribs. Do not hesitate. Do not look around. Grip the cup and don't let go.
The figure was almost upon him. Harry's eyes on the Triwizard Cup lying beside him. The Portkey was supposed to be two-way. It was supposed to take him back, right?
He saw the cloaked figure raise a wand. There was no time. He had to act. He poured every ounce of his will, his desperation, his desire to return, and gripped the cup quickly with his hands, hoping the Portkey will reactivate.
At the same time, the cloaked figure—Peter Pettigrew's voice recognizable—shouted, "Reducto!"
A jet of red light hit Harry in the chest at the exact same moment he felt the familiar, wrenching pull at his navel. Pain exploded in his arm as he fell, the spell and the Portkey's violent activation tearing at him simultaneously. The world spun into a nauseating vortex of colour and pain.