Previous Chapters:
Chapter 1: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003585181
Chapter 2: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003585386
Chapter 3: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003589099
Chapter 4: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003589999
Chapter 5: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003590737
Chapter 6: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003592048
Chapter 7: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003593450
Chapter 8: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003594715
Chapter 9: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003595876
Chapter 10: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003596713
Chapter 11: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003597502
Chapter 12: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003598647
Chapter 13: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003600597
Chapter 14: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003602821
Chapter 15: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003605031
Chapter 16: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003605690
Chapter 17: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003607525
Chapter 18: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003607955
Chapter 19: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003608845
Chapter 20: https://harrypotter.fandom.com/f/p/4400000000003609937
Tags: @MeowTasticCat @Bellatrisblack @Diantha Angelina Black @CatsAndRoblox @Kakaonut @Potatopanda2121
Chapter Twenty-One: Rita Skeeter’s Scoop
Nearly everybody got up late on Boxing Day. The Slytherin common room was much quieter than it had been lately, many yawns punctuating the lazy conversations.
Allison and the others who had signed up for the Boxing Day train were gone before Harry had even woken up, which was to bad because Harry thought he’d need some back up dealing with the Tracey and Terence situation.
When he got up to breakfast however he was pleasantly surprised to see they weren’t at each other’s throats. He soon inferred that Tracey and Terence had reached an unspoken agreement not to discuss what had happened the night before. The actual awkwardness as it turned out came from Theodore and Colin, who seemed to not quite know how to interact with each other normally anymore, tripping over everything each said or did.
Terence and Harry wasted no time in telling the others about the conversation they had overheard between Snape and Karkaroff as well as Madame Maxime and Hagrid. No one was really surprised when hearing the confirmation that Hagrid was a half-giant.
‘The man it over eleven feet tall,’ said Theodore in a matter-of-fact tone, ‘I’d be more surprised if you told me he was fully human.’
It was time now to think of the homework they had neglected during the first week of the holidays. Everybody seemed to be feeling rather relaxed or at least apathetic now that Christmas was over—everybody except Harry, that is, who was starting (once again) to feel slightly nervous.
The trouble was that February the twenty-fourth looked a lot closer from this side of Christmas, and he still hadn’t done anything about working out the clue inside the golden egg. He therefore started taking the egg out of his trunk every time he went up to the dormitory, opening it, and listening intently, hoping that this time it would make some sense. He strained to think what the sound reminded him of, apart from thirty musical saws, but he had never heard anything else like it. He closed the egg, shook it vigorously, and opened it again to see if the sound had changed, but it hadn’t. He tried asking the egg questions, shouting over all the wailing, but nothing happened. He even threw the egg across the room—though he hadn’t really expected that to help.
Harry had not forgotten the hint that Cedric had given him, but his less-than-friendly feelings toward Cedric just now meant that he was keen not to take his help if he could avoid it. In any case, it seemed to him that if Cedric had really wanted to give Harry a hand, he would have been a lot more explicit. Harry, had told Cedric exactly what was coming in the first task—and Cedric’s idea of a fair exchange had been to tell Harry to take a bath. Well, he didn’t need that sort of rubbishy help—not from someone who kept walking down corridors hand in hand with Cho, anyway.
The day before start of winter term the hogwarts train returned with all the students who had left both at the start of break and on Boxing Day. Harry had been studying enchanted eggs in the library when Tracey looked up and her jaw dropped, ‘Alli?’
Harry looked around to welcome Allison back when his jaw dropped as well. Allison apparently took the time off to get a fresh look as her shoulder length straight black hair had been cut into a very short bob style with a pink headband, and along with the three silver piercings she already had in her ears, she now had a small stud on her left nostril.
‘Alli, you look great!’ said Tracey.
‘Thanks, I really needed a new look.’
‘How is your mother?’ Harry asked.
‘Still sick, but her mood was lifted by me wearing her old wedding dress to the Yule Ball and then coming home for a week, so that was at least something.’
And so the first day of the new term arrived, and Harry set off to lessons, weighed down with books, parchment, and quills as usual, but also with the lurking worry of the egg heavy in his stomach, as though he were carrying that around with him too.
Snow was still thick upon the grounds, and the greenhouse windows were covered in condensation so thick that they couldn’t see into them as they walked past. Nobody was looking forward to Care of Magical Creatures much in this weather, although Allison had jokingly said the skrewts blasts will keep them warm.
When they arrived at Hagrid’s cabin, however, they found an elderly witch with closely cropped gray hair and a very prominent chin standing before his front door.
‘Hurry up, now, the bell rang five minutes ago,’ she barked at them as they struggled toward her through the snow.
‘Are you a sub?’ Theodore asked, ‘Is Hagrid sick?’
‘My name is Professor Grubbly-Plank,’ she said briskly. ‘I am your temporary Care of Magical Creatures teacher.’
‘Where’s Hagrid?’ Harry repeated loudly.
‘He is indisposed,’ said Professor Grubbly-Plank shortly.
Soft and unpleasant laughter reached Harry’s ears. He turned; Pansy Parkinson and the rest of her gang had joined the class. All of them looked gleeful, and none of them looked surprised to see Professor Grubbly-Plank.
'This way, please,' said Professor Grubbly-Plank, and she strode off around the paddock where the Beauxbatons horses were shivering. Harry, Theodore, Allison, and Tracey followed her, looking back over their shoulders at Hagrid’s cabin. All the curtains were closed. Was Hagrid in there, alone and ill?
'You didn't answer my friends question, is Hagrid sick?' Harry asked, hurrying to catch up with Professor Grubbly-Plank.
'Never you mind,' she said as though she thought he was being nosy.
'I do mind, though, he's my friend,' said Harry hotly. 'What’s wrong with him?'
Professor Grubbly-Plank acted as though she couldn’t hear him. She led them past the paddock where the huge Beauxbatons horses were standing, huddled against the cold, and toward a tree on the edge of the forest, where a large and beautiful unicorn was tethered.
Many of the girls 'ooooohed!' at the sight of the unicorn.
'It is absolutely stunning,' whispered Hermione Granger. 'I've never seen one up close? Did you barrow one from the Unicorn Parkinson Prosperity or did you manage to catch one?'
The unicorn was so brightly white it made the snow all around look gray. It was pawing the ground nervously with its golden hooves and throwing back its horned head.
'Boys keep back!' barked Professor Grubbly-Plank, throwing out an arm and catching Harry hard in the chest. 'They prefer the woman’s touch, unicorns. Girls to the front, and approach with care, come on, easy does it...'
She and the girls walked slowly forward toward the unicorn, leaving the boys standing near the paddock fence, watching. The moment Professor Grubbly-Plank was out of earshot, Harry turned to Theodore.
'What d’you reckon’s wrong with him? You don’t think a skrewt got him? They are part manticore and their stings are—?'
Harry couldn't quite finish, his adoptive grandfather Lyall Lupin had died from a manticore still nearly two years ago, and it still hurt to think about sometimes. He was distracted from his thoughts by Blaise Zabini.
'Hagrid hasn't been stung, Potter, though I'd like to see what would happen if he was,' said Zabini softly. 'No, he’s has just been humiliated and too cowardous to show his monstrous face.'
'What d’you mean?' said Harry sharply.
Zabini pulled out a folded newsprint from the pocket of his robes.
'If you started reading more thoroughly you might not be left in the dark all the time,' he said, handing Harry the paper. 'Its all rather comedic if you as me.'
He smirked as Harry snatched the page, unfolded it, and read it, with Theodore, Ron, and Neville looking over his shoulder. It was an article topped with a picture of Hagrid looking extremely shifty.
"DUMBLEDORE’S GIANT MISTAKE
Albus Dumbledore, eccentric Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, has never been afraid to make controversial staff appointments, writes Rita Skeeter, Special Correspondent. Last year he hired werewolf Remus Lupin to teach Defense Against the Dark Arts, in September of this year, he hired Alastor “Mad-Eye” Moody, the notoriously jinx-happy ex-Auror, to take Lupin's place, a decision that caused many raised eyebrows at the Ministry of Magic, given Moody’s well-known habit of attacking anybody who makes a sudden movement in his presence. Remus Lupin and Mad-Eye Moody, however, looks responsible and kindly when set beside the part-human Dumbledore employs to teach Care of Magical Creatures.
Rubeus Hagrid, who admits to being expelled from Hogwarts in his third year, has enjoyed the position of gamekeeper at the school ever since, a job secured for him by Dumbledore. Last year, however, Hagrid used his mysterious influence over the headmaster to secure the additional post of Care of Magical Creatures teacher, over the heads of many better-qualified candidates.
An alarmingly large and ferocious-looking man, Hagrid has been using his newfound authority to terrify the students in his care with a succession of horrific creatures. While Dumbledore turns a blind eye, Hagrid has maimed several pupils during a series of lessons that many admit to being 'very frightening.'
'I was clawed at by a hippogriff,' says Draco Malfoy, a fourth-year student.
'I got a bad bite off a flobberworm,' claimed Vincent Crabbe.
'His new abominations have exploded in my face multiple times,' said Pansy Parkinson, a girl in the same year as Malfoy. 'Hagrid is dangerous be we have been to terrified to speak out about him.'
Hagrid has no intention of ceasing his campaign of intimidation, however. In conversation with a Daily Prophet reporter last month, he admitted breeding creatures he has dubbed 'Blast-Ended Skrewts,' highly dangerous crosses between manticores and fire-crabs. The creation of new breeds of magical creature is, of course, an activity usually closely observed by the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures. Hagrid, however, considers himself to be above such petty restrictions.
'It was quite fun,' he says, before hastily changing the subject.
As if this were not enough, the Daily Prophet has now unearthed evidence that Hagrid is not—as he has always pretended—a pure-blood wizard. He is not, in fact, even pure human. His mother, we can exclusively reveal, is none other than the giantess Fridwulfa, whose whereabouts are currently unknown.
Bloodthirsty and brutal, the giants brought themselves to the point of extinction by warring amongst themselves during the last century. The handful that remained joined the ranks of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, and were responsible for some of the worst mass Muggle killings of his reign of terror. While many of the giants who served He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named were killed by Aurors working against the Dark Side, Fridwulfa was not among them. It is possible she escaped to one of the giant communities still existing in foreign mountain ranges. If his antics during Care of Magical Creatures lessons are any guide, however, Fridwulfa’s son appears to have inherited her brutal nature.
In a bizarre twist, Hagrid is reputed to have developed a close friendship with the boy who brought around You-Know-Who’s fall from power—thereby driving Hagrid’s own mother, like the rest of You-Know-Who’s supporters, into hiding. Perhaps Harry Potter is unaware of the unpleasant truth about his large friend—but Albus Dumbledore surely has a duty to ensure that Harry Potter, along with his fellow students, is warned about the dangers of associating with part-giants."
Harry finished reading and looked up at Theodore, who looked in shock from the amount of combined facts and lies the Prophet had combined. For a brief moment Harry wondered if Terence had blabbered about what he heard, but quickly dismissed that idea as he trusted his friend.
'Where did they get all this information?' he whispered.
But that wasn’t what was bothering Harry.
'What d’you mean, ‘we have been terrified of Hagrid’?' Harry spat at Blaise.
'What’s this rubbish about'—he pointed at Crabbe—'getting a bad bite off a flobberworm? They haven’t even got teeth!'
Crabbe was sniggering, apparently very pleased with himself.
'It is past time we have teachers that are actually our kind, not monsters or half-breeds,' said Zabini, his dark eyes glinting. 'My mother will not be happy when she reads this, as I assume most proper wizarding families will be. Yet another teacher endangering their kids.'
'You—'
'Are you paying attention over there?'
Professor Grubbly-Plank’s voice carried over to the boys; the girls were all clustered around the unicorn now, stroking it. Harry was so angry that the Daily Prophet article shook in his hands as he turned to stare unseeingly at the unicorn, whose many magical properties Professor Grubbly-Plank was now enumerating in a loud voice, so that the boys could hear too.
'That was a far better lesson than I would normally get in that class,' said Pansy loudly when the lesson had ended and they were all heading back to the castle for lunch. 'Dealing with proper creatures and proper teachers.'
'Pansy, you have gotten to see multiple unicorns every summer for three years, do you ever get bored of typical magical creatures?'
'Perhaps, but anything is better than Hagrid teaching the class. I preferred him as a mere servant.'
Harry wished he could get some back up from the girls as they often had better come backs for Pansy, but Allison was too busy talking to Tracey about her upcoming date in Hogsmeade.
Once in the Great Hall Harry quickly tracked Terence down and showed him the article, 'Dia ár sábháil, how did they find out? Do you think Madam Maxime tipped the Prophet off as revenge?'
'I don't think she was that bitter, someone must have found off another way.'
'Do you think it was that bloody Skeeter woman?' Terence asked.
'The article was uncredited, it did sound like her but I don't see how she could have gotten her quotes and information, Hagrid mentioned she's banned from the grounds.'
Theodore than chipped in, 'Maybe she has an invisibility cloak, they are rare but someone like her might be able to afford one.'
'That's an idea,' said Harry, ladling chicken casserole onto his plate and splashing it everywhere in his anger. 'Sort of thing she’d do, isn’t it, hide in bushes listening to people. Although Hagrid should have never been talking about his giantess mother in the garden multiple people were in.'
Harry paused his Giant talk for a moment as Colin had sat down next to Theodore and didn't feeling like re-explaining everything that had happened, instead he worded his conclusion carefully, 'I going to see him after charms. Tell him we want him back...some of you should come to show your support.' The last part he said a little louder so Tracey and Allison would hear.
'What?' they said in unison as they hadn't heard any of the previous discussion.
'We're going to Hagrid's after dinner, you two in?'
'Sure, sounds fun.'
So that evening after dinner, the four of them plus Terence left the castle once more and went down through the frozen grounds to Hagrid’s cabin. They knocked, and Fang’s booming barks answered.
'Hagrid, it’s us!' Harry shouted, pounding on the door. 'Open up!'
Hagrid didn’t answer. They could hear Fang scratching at the door, whining, but it didn’t open. They hammered on it for ten more minutes; Allison even went and banged on one of the windows, but there was no response.
'Why won't he see us?' Tracey said when they had finally given up and were walking back to the school. 'We're the ones trying to help and support him.'
But it seemed that Hagrid did not wish to be seen. They didn’t see a sign of him all week. He didn’t appear at the staff table at mealtimes, they didn’t see him going about his gamekeeper duties on the grounds, and Professor Grubbly-Plank continued to take the Care of Magical Creatures classes. Pansy was gloating at every possible opportunity.
'Do you all really miss that oaf?' she kept chuckling at Harry whenever there was a teacher around, so that she was safe from Harry’s retaliation. 'You must feel home sick not having a beast around at all times.'
The Hogsmeade visit had arrived and Harry had decided to join Allison, Tracey, and Urquhart, to Theodore's surprise.
'Wouldn't you rather be like me and take advantage of the less crowded Hogwarts to study? Its just over a month until the next task and the egg isn't going to solve itself.'
'Oh I—I reckon I’ve got a pretty good idea what it’s about now,' Harry lied.
'You have?' said Theodore, looking suspicious. 'Okay than...'
Harry’s insides gave a guilty squirm, but he ignored them. He still had five weeks to work out that egg clue, after all, and that was ages...whereas if he went into Hogsmeade, he might run into Hagrid, and get a chance to persuade him to come back.
He, Allison, Tracey and her date left the castle together on Saturday and set off through the cold, wet grounds toward the gates. As they passed the Durmstrang ship moored in the lake, they saw Viktor Krum emerge onto the deck, dressed in nothing but swimming trunks. He was very skinny indeed, but apparently a lot tougher than he looked, because he climbed up onto the side of the ship, stretched out his arms, and dived, right into the lake.
'He’s mad!' said Harry, staring at Krum’s dark head as it bobbed out into the middle of the lake. 'It must be freezing, it’s January!'
'It might be colder in Bulgaria, and I know its colder in Svalbard,' said Allison, 'this cold must not be as bad to him.'
'Well,' said Tracey half distracted, 'I just hope someone has warned him about the giant squid.'
Harry kept his eyes skinned for a sign of Hagrid all the way down the slushy High Street, it was just him and Allison searching now as Tracey and Urquhart had gone off to the Cafe for their date. Harry eventually suggested a visit to the Three Broomsticks once he had ascertained that Hagrid was not in any of the shops. The pub was as crowded as ever, but one quick look around at all the tables told Harry that Hagrid wasn’t there. Heart sinking, he went up to the bar with Allison, ordered three butter-beers from Madam Rosmerta, and thought gloomily that he might just as well have stayed behind and listened to the egg wailing after all.
'What is he doing here?' Allison whispered in an annoyed tone. 'Look over there!'
She pointed into the mirror behind the bar, and Harry saw Ludo Bagman reflected there, sitting in a shadowy corner with a bunch of goblins. Bagman was talking very fast in a low voice to the goblins, all of whom had their arms crossed and were looking rather menacing.
It was indeed odd, Harry thought, that Bagman was here at the Three Broomsticks on a weekend when there was no Triwizard event, and therefore no judging to be done. He watched Bagman in the mirror. He was looking strained again, quite as strained as he had that night in the forest before the Dark Mark had appeared. But just then Bagman glanced over at the bar, saw Harry, and stood up.
'In a moment, in a moment!' Harry heard him say brusquely to the goblins, and Bagman hurried through the pub toward Harry, his boyish grin back in place. 'Harry! How are you? Been hoping to run into you! Everything going all right?'
'Fine, thanks,' said Harry, although he would rather be talking to Pansy Parkinson at the moment than Bagman.
'Wonder if I could have a quick, private word, Harry?' said Bagman eagerly. 'You couldn’t give us a moment, miss, could you?'
'Um—I guess?' said Allison, and she went off to find a table.
Bagman led Harry along the bar to the end furthest from Madam Rosmerta.
'Well, I just thought I’d congratulate you once again on your splendid performance against that Horntail, Harry,' said Bagman. 'Really superb.'
'Thanks,' said Harry, but he knew this couldn’t be all that Bagman wanted to say, because he could have congratulated Harry in front of Allison or the barmaid. Bagman didn’t seem in any particular rush to spill the beans, though. Harry saw him glance into the mirror over the bar at the goblins, who were all watching him and Harry in silence through their dark, slanting eyes.
'Absolute nightmare,' said Bagman to Harry in an undertone, noticing Harry watching the goblins too. 'Their English isn’t too good...translations spells don't work so well on non-human languages. This lot keep gabbling in Gobbledegook...and I only know one word of Gobbledegook. Bladvak. It means ‘pickax.’ I don’t like to use it in case they think I’m threatening them.'
He gave a short, booming laugh, but Harry could help hear a little hesitation in said laugh.
'What do they want?' Harry said, noticing how the goblins were still watching Bagman very closely.
'Er—well...' said Bagman, looking suddenly nervous. 'They...er...they’re looking for Barry Crouch.'
'Why are they looking for him here?' said Harry. 'He’s at the Ministry in London, isn’t he?'
'Er...as a matter of fact, I’ve no idea where he is,' said Bagman. 'He’s sort of...stopped coming to work. Been absent for a couple of weeks now. Young Percy, his assistant, says he’s ill. Apparently he’s just been sending instructions in by owl. But would you mind not mentioning that to anyone, Harry? Because Rita Skeeter’s still poking around everywhere she can, and I’m willing to bet she’d work up Barty’s illness into something sinister. Probably say he’s gone missing like Bertha Jorkins.'
'Have they finally found her, Ms Jorkins I mean?' Harry asked.
'No,' said Bagman, looking strained again. 'I’ve got people looking, of course...' (About time, thought Harry) 'and it’s all very strange. She definitely arrived in Albania, because she met her second cousin there. And then she left the cousin’s house to go south and see an aunt...and she seems to have vanished without trace en route. Blowed if I can see where she’s got to...she doesn’t seem the type to elope, for instance...but still...What are we doing, talking about goblins and Bertha Jorkins? I really wanted to ask you'—he lowered his voice—'how are you getting on with your golden egg?'
'Sir I said at Christmas I didn't want to talk about it, but I am, er...doing not bad,' Harry said untruthfully.
Bagman seemed to know he wasn’t being honest.
'Listen, Harry,' he said (still in a very low voice), ‘I feel very bad about what has happened to you...you were thrown into this dangerous tournament, you didn’t volunteer for it...and if...’ (his voice was so quiet now, Harry had to lean closer to listen) ‘if I can help at all...just a small tip in the right direction...I’ve taken a liking to you...the way you got past that dragon...well, just say the word.’
Harry just stared up into Bagman’s round face and blue eyes with astonishment, he wasn’t sure how many times he could tell this man no.
‘Mr Bagman, I really do appreciate your willingness to help, but we’re supposed to figure this clue out on our own. I’ve already got dozens of people thinking I’m a cheat, I don’t want to give them any reason to think they were right,’ he said this all very carefully to keep his voice casual and not sound as though he was accusing the head of the Department of Magical Games and Sports of breaking the rules.
‘Well...well, yes,’ said Bagman impatiently, ‘but—come on, Harry—we all want a Hogwarts victory, don’t we?’
'Have you offered Cedric help?' Harry asked.
The smallest of frowns creased Bagman’s smooth face.
‘No, I haven’t,’ he said. ‘I—well, like I say, I’ve taken a liking to you. Just thought I’d offer...’
‘Well, thanks,’ said Harry, ‘but I think I’m nearly there with the egg...couple more days should crack it.’
A small part of him wondered why he was refusing Bagman’s help, except that Bagman was almost a stranger to him, and accepting his assistance would feel somehow much more like cheating than asking advice from his friends, Hagrid, or his family. It didn’t help that Tracey’s suspicions of Bagman still rang in his head.
Bagman looked almost affronted, but couldn’t say much more as Fred and George Weasley turned up at that point.
‘Hello, Mr. Bagman,’ said Fred brightly. ‘Can we buy you a drink?’
‘Er...no,’ said Bagman, with a last disappointed glance at Harry, ‘no, thank you, boys...’
Fred and George looked quite as disappointed as Bagman, who was surveying Harry as though he had let him down badly.
‘Well, I must dash,’ he said. ‘Nice seeing you all. Good luck, Harry.’
He hurried out of the pub. The goblins all slid off their chairs and exited after him. Harry went to rejoin Allison.
‘That looked very awkward, another minute and was going to go over there and rescue you,’ she said, the moment Harry had sat down.
‘He offered to help me with the golden egg again,’ said Harry.
‘I am really starting to agree with Tracey,’ she said a little miffed. ‘He definitely wants you to win for some reason, and is clearly willing to bend the rules to get what he wants. He needn’t bother though, I heard you tell Theo you had solved the clue.’
‘Well...that might have been a slight exaggeration so he’d let me go to Hogsmeade,’ Harry confessed.
One thing that Harry liked about Allison was that she was usually on his side, she didn’t bother him about the egg, instead she changed the topic.
‘Those goblins he was with didn’t look Happy,’ she said, sipping her butterbeer. ‘Why were they hounding him?’
‘Looking for Crouch, according to Bagman,’ said Harry. ‘He’s still ill. Hasn’t been into work.’
‘Maybe his law enforcement day’s are catching up to him, my dad isn’t even flirty yet but some day he looks like he’s fifty, or Moody who looks over seventy but I hear is just over fifty.’
Harry nodded, then circled back to the goblins, ‘It’s odd though that goblins would be looking for Mr Crouch here of all places, wouldn’t his home be a better bet?’
‘Well maybe he’s recovering somewhere more private, or maybe he’s sick of work and actually taking a tropical vacation in secret. Perhaps-oh no!’
Harry looked around to see what had caught Allison’s eye. Rita Skeeter had just entered the pub. She was wearing banana-yellow robes today; her long nails were painted shocking pink, and she was accompanied by her paunchy photographer. She bought drinks, and she and the photographer made their way through the crowds to a table nearby, Harry and Allison glared at her as she approached. She was talking fast and looking very satisfied about something.
‘...didn’t seem very keen to talk to us, did he, Bozo? Now, why would that be, do you think? And what’s he doing with a pack of goblins in tow anyway? Showing them the sights...what non-sense...he was always a bad liar. Reckon something’s up? Think we should do a bit of digging? “Disgraced Ex-Head of Magical Games and Sports, Ludo Bagman...” Snappy start to a sentence, Bozo—we just need to find a story to fit it—‘
‘Trying to ruin someone else’s life?’ said Harry loudly.
A few people looked around. Rita Skeeter’s eyes widened behind her jeweled spectacles as she saw who had spoken.
‘Harry!’ she said, beaming. ‘How lovely! Why don’t you come and join—?’
‘I wouldn’t come near you with a ten-foot broomstick,’ said Harry furiously. ‘What did you do that to Hagrid for, eh?’
Rita Skeeter raised her heavily penciled eyebrows. ‘Our readers have a right to the truth, Harry. I am merely doing my—‘
‘Who cares if he’s half-giant?’ Harry shouted. ‘There’s nothing wrong with him! He is the gentlest soul I know!’
The whole pub had gone very quiet. Madam Rosmerta was staring over from behind the bar, apparently oblivious to the fact that the flagon she was filling with mead was overflowing.
Rita Skeeter’s smile flickered very slightly, but she hitched it back almost at once; she snapped open her crocodile-skin handbag, pulled out her new Quick-Quotes Quill, and said, ‘How about giving me an interview about the Hagrid you know, Harry? The man behind the muscles? Your unlikely friendship and the reasons behind it. Would you call him a father substitute?’
Allison stood up very abruptly, and cracked her knuckles, ‘Oh look, another quill for me to break.’
The quill started shivering and tried floating as far away from Allison’s grasp as possible, Rita Skeeter seemed less phased than her quill.
‘Sit down, you silly little girl, it would be a shame if I had to write a piece on how auror Albert Runcorn was nowhere to be found during the World Cup incident, or that he supposedly doesn’t seem to care that his wife of fifteen years can barely leave her bed. His bosses wouldn’t like that, and he would be upset at the daughter that caused it,’ said Rita Skeeter in a quiet cold voice, her eyes hardening as they fell on Allison. ‘So I’d keep your fat hands off my property and your mouth shut, or you will regret it.’
Instead of getting Allison to calm down, her blue eyes seemed to be lit with icey fire. Harry took her arm and slowly started walking away. ‘Come on Allison, I think it’s best we leave.’
They left; many people were staring at them as they went. Harry glanced back as they reached the door. Rita Skeeter’s Quick-Quotes Quill was zooming backward and forward over a piece of parchment on the table.
‘She might skip your father for now, he’s too powerful, but I’d be shocked if the next piece didn’t involve you in someway, Allison,’ said Harry in a low and worried voice as they walked quickly back up the street.
‘I don’t care,’ said Allison defiantly; she was shaking with rage. 'Story or no story I am going to get my revenge. Silly little girl, my foot! First you, then Hagrid, now my father, she is going to pay!’
‘Allison, I want Rita to suffer as much as you do, but she is not only an adult, but an adult with a lot of influence. Don’t do something you’ll regret.’
‘I am more clever than her, Harry, whatever I decide to do she won’t see coming,’ Allison was now striding along so fast that it was all Harry could do to keep up with her. ‘Oh and we should visit Hagrid now! Rita is in the wrong, not him, so it’s time he stop hiding!’
Breaking into a run, she led them all the way back up the road, through the gates flanked by winged boars, and up through the grounds to Hagrid’s cabin.
The curtains were still drawn, and they could hear Fang barking as they approached.
'Hagrid!' Allison shouted, pounding on his front door. 'Hagrid, it is time to stop hiding, we want you back!’
Harry chimed in, ‘Nobody that cares about has a problem with you being a half-giant, Hagrid! If you keep hiding out in your cabin than you are letting a cruel person win. Please let us in—‘
The door opened. Harry was about to thank Hagrid for finally opening the door, but then stopped, because he had found himself face-to-face, not with Hagrid, but with Albus Dumbledore.
‘Good afternoon,’ he said pleasantly, smiling down at them.
‘We-um-wanted to she Hagrid, is he ok?’ said Harry in a quieter voice than how he had been yelling a moment ago.
‘Yes, I surmised as much,’ said Dumbledore, his eyes twinkling. ‘Why don’t you come in?’
‘Yes...alright,’ said Allison.
She and Harry went into the cabin; Fang launched himself upon Harry the moment he entered, barking madly and trying to lick his ears. Harry fended off Fang and looked around.
Hagrid was sitting at his table, where there were two large mugs of tea. He looked a real mess. His face was blotchy, his eyes swollen, and he had gone to the other extreme where his hair was concerned; far from trying to make it behave, it now looked like a wig of tangled wire.
‘Hi, Hagrid,’ said Harry.
Hagrid looked up.
‘’Lo,’ he said in a very hoarse voice.
‘More tea, I think,’ said Dumbledore, closing the door behind Harry and Allison, drawing out his wand, and twiddling it; a revolving tea tray appeared in midair along with a plate of cakes. Dumbledore magicked the tray onto the table, and everybody sat down. There was a slight pause, and then Dumbledore said, ‘Did you by any chance hear what Miss Runcorn and Mr Potter were shouting, Hagrid?’
Allison went slightly pink, a rare colour on her, but Dumbledore smiled at her and continued, ‘Allison, Harry, and several other students including Tracey Davis, Ron Weasley, and Terry Boot still seem to want you back. And Harry and his friends still want to get to know you, judging by the way they were attempting to break down the door.’
‘Of course we still want to know you!’ Harry said, staring at Hagrid. ‘You don’t think anything that Skeeter cow—sorry, Professor,’ he added quickly, looking at Dumbledore.
‘I have gone temporarily deaf and haven’t any idea what you said, Harry,’ said Dumbledore, twiddling his thumbs and staring at the ceiling.
‘Er—right,’ said Harry sheepishly. ‘I just meant—Hagrid, how could you think we’d care what that—woman—wrote about you?’
Two fat tears leaked out of Hagrid’s beetle-black eyes and fell slowly into his tangled beard.
‘Living proof of what I’ve been telling you, Hagrid,’ said Dumbledore, still looking carefully up at the ceiling. ‘I have shown you the letters from the countless parents who remember you from their own days here, telling me in no uncertain terms that if I sacked you, they would have something to say about it. Charlie Weasley even sent me a howler when he thought I had fired you—‘
‘Not all of ’em,’ said Hagrid hoarsely. ‘Not all of ’em wan’ me ter stay.’
‘Really, Hagrid, if you are holding out for universal popularity, I’m afraid you will be in this cabin for a very long time,’ said Dumbledore, now peering sternly over his half-moon spectacles. ‘Not a week has passed since I became headmaster of this school that I haven’t had at least one owl complaining about the way I run it. But what should I do? Barricade myself in my study and refuse to talk to anybody?’
‘Yeh—yeh’re not half-giant!’ said Hagrid croakily.
‘Hagrid, look what I’ve got for relatives!’ Harry said furiously. ‘My mother’s side is filled with the worst muggles I know, yet neither she or I are anything like them.’
Allison then spoke up, ‘I don’t talk about this often Hagrid, but my grandmother on my mothers side was a squib, one of the lowest member of the wizarding world, but she didn’t let the stigma run her out of the magical world she had come to love. She found work within the magical world, she married a wizard she loved, she didn’t let how she was born dictate her life.’
This was the first time Harry had ever heard this, he knew through Theodore that Allison had a squib ancestor, but he never knew the the story involved.
‘An excellent point,’ said Professor Dumbledore. ‘My own brother, Aberforth, was prosecuted for practicing inappropriate charms on a goat. It was all over the papers, but did Aberforth hide? No, he did not! He held his head high and went about his business as usual! Of course, I’m not entirely sure he can still read, so that may not have been bravery...’
‘Continue to teach, Hagrid,’ Allison begged. ‘It maybe true your lesson are unordinary, but that is what makes them exciting, I am so bored in half my classes because the they are teaching the same way the classes have been taught for a hundred or more years, but every class wth you is an adventure.’
Hagrid gulped. More tears leaked out down his cheeks and into his tangled beard.
Dumbledore stood up. ‘I refuse to accept your resignation, Hagrid, and I expect you back at work on Monday,’ he said. ‘You will join me for breakfast at eight-thirty in the Great Hall. No excuses. Good afternoon to you all.’
Dumbledore left the cabin, pausing only to scratch Fang’s ears. When the door had shut behind him, Hagrid began to sob into his dustbin-lid-sized hands. Harry kept patting his arm, and at last, Hagrid looked up, his eyes very red indeed, and said, ‘Great man, Dumbledore...great man...’
‘He knows that you are equally a great man,’ said Allison.
Hagrid, wiping his eyes on the back of his hand. ‘I bin stupid...my ol’ dad woulda bin ashamed o’ the way I’ve bin behavin...’ More tears leaked out, but he wiped them away more forcefully, and said, ‘Never shown you a picture of my old dad, have I? Here...’
Hagrid got up, went over to his dresser, opened a drawer, and pulled out a picture of a short wizard with Hagrid’s crinkled black eyes, beaming as he sat on top of Hagrid’s shoulder. Hagrid was a good seven or eight feet tall, judging by the apple tree beside him, but his face was beardless, young, round, and smooth—he looked hardly older than eleven.
‘Tha’ was taken jus’ after I got excepted inter Hogwarts,’ Hagrid croaked. ‘Dad was dead chuffed...thought I migh’ not be a wizard, see, ’cos me mum...well, anyway. ’Course, I never was great shakes at magic, really...but at least he never saw me expelled. Died, see, in me second year...’
Harry had heard some of this during the Yule Ball, so he had to pretend this was the first time hearing this tale.
‘Dumbledore was the one who stuck up for me after Dad went. Got me the gamekeeper job...trusts people, he does. Gives ’em second chances...tha’s what sets him apar’ from other heads, see. He’ll accept anyone at Hogwarts, s’long as they’ve got the talent. Knows people can turn out okay even if their families weren’...well...all tha’ respectable. But some don’ understand that. There’s some who’d always hold it against yeh...there’s some who’d even pretend they just had big bones rather than stand up an’ say—I am what I am, an’ I’m not ashamed. ‘Never be ashamed,’ my ol’ dad used ter say, ‘there’s some who’ll hold it against you, but they’re not worth botherin’ with.’ An’ he was right. I’ve bin an idiot. I’m not botherin’ with her no more, I promise yeh that. Big bones...I’ll give her big bones.’
Harry and Allison looked at each another nervously; Harry would rather have taken fifty Blast-Ended Skrewts for a walk than admit to Hagrid that he had overheard him talking to Madame Maxime, but Hagrid was still talking, apparently unaware that he had said anything odd.
‘Yeh know wha’, Harry?’ he said, looking up from the photograph of his father, his eyes very bright, ‘when I firs’ met you, you reminded me o’ me a bit. Mum an’ Dad gone, an’ you didn’t know were ya belonged, remember? Not sure who ya really were...an’ now look at yeh, Harry! School champion!’
He looked at Harry for a moment and then said, very seriously, ‘Yeh know what I’d love, Harry? I’d love yeh ter win, I really would. It’d show ’em all...yeh don’ have ter be pureblood ter do it. Yeh don’ have ter be ashamed of what yeh are. It’d show ’em Dumbledore’s the one who’s got it righ’, lettin’ anyone in as long as they can do magic. How you doin’ with that egg, Harry?’
‘Great,’ said Harry. ‘Really great.’
Hagrid’s miserable face broke into a wide, watery smile. ‘Tha’s my boy...you show ’em, Harry, you show ’em. Beat ’em all.’
Lying to Hagrid wasn’t quite like lying to anyone else. Harry went back to the castle later that afternoon with Allison, unable to banish the image of the happy expression on Hagrid’s whiskery face as he had imagined Harry winning the tournament. The incomprehensible egg weighed more heavily than ever on Harry’s conscience that evening, and by the time he had got into bed, he had made up his mind—it was time to shelve his pride and see if Cedric’s hint was worth anything.
