Chapter 91: Beauxbatons and Durmstrangs

During the following week, the conflict between Chris and the Ravenclaws soon died and there seemed to be only one topic of conversation, no matter where Chris went: the Triwizard Tournament. Rumors were flying from student to student like highly contagious germs: who was going to try for Hogwarts champion, what the tournament would involve, how the students from Beauxbatons and Durmstrang differed from themselves.

Chris noticed too that the castle seemed to be undergoing an extra-thorough cleaning. Several grimy portraits had been scrubbed, much to the displeasure of their subjects, who sat hud­dled in their frames muttering darkly and wincing as they felt their raw pink faces. The suits of armor were suddenly gleaming and moving without squeaking, and Argus Filch, the caretaker, was be­having so ferociously to any students who forgot to wipe their shoes that he terrified a pair of first-year girls into hysterics.

Other members of the staff seemed oddly tense too.

"Kindly don't confuse between these plants Catterick. It'll be a shame in front of Beauxbatons." Professor Sprout said at the end of one particularly difficult lesson, during Melvin mixed up in few different plants.

When they went down to breakfast on the morning of the thir­tieth of October, they found that the Great Hall had been deco­rated overnight. Enormous silk banners hung from the walls, each of them representing a Hogwarts House: red with a gold lion for Gryffindor, blue with a bronze eagle for Ravenclaw, yellow with a black badger for Hufflepuff, and green with a silver serpent for Slytherin. Behind the teachers' table, the largest banner of all bore the Hogwarts coat of arms: lion, eagle, badger, and snake united around a large letter H.

"I really miss our Gryffindor table. Can we sit there?" Chris asked, looking at the table where Fred and George were laughing greedily about something.

Ginny looked around and saw Harry, Ron and Hermione sitting there.

"No we can't." Ginny snapped. "Don't forgot what she did few days ago."

Chris sighed and sat on the Ravenclaw table.

Hermione had started something like a protest, for the House-elves, a month now, she had made different colours of badges all bearing the same letters: S.P.E.W.

"It's S-P-E-W. Stands for the Society for the Promotion of Elfish Welfare." One evening she said when Neville, Ginny and Chris were doing some homeworks together. "Two Sickles to join — that buys a badge — to join this campaign."

Hermione had taken to rattling around the Gryffindor common room every evening, cornering people and shaking the collecting tin un­der their noses. She had been badgering Harry and Ron, first to wear the badges, then to persuade others to do the same.

"You do realize that your sheets are changed, your fires lit, your classrooms cleaned, and your food cooked by a group of magical creatures who are unpaid and enslaved?" she kept saying fiercely.

Some people, like Neville, had paid up just to stop Hermione from glowering at them. A few seemed mildly interested in what she had to say, but were reluctant to take a more active role in cam­paigning. Many regarded the whole thing as a joke.

Problem started when she almost scared the first years to buy badges. Most of them buyed including Dennis, Colin's brother which angered Ginny in extreme. And everytime someone agreed on buying a badge, she looked at Chris and Ginny triumphantly.

After that Chris dropped the idea of talking to Hermione again, as Ginny was getting more angry everytime someone mentioned Hermione's name.

"The Hall is looking magnificent, isn't it?" Cho Chang spoke as all four of them started eating breakfast.

"Truly." Luna replied. "It's beautiful. I love colours."

"Yeah... It's colourful too." Cho said awkwardly.

"Hi I'm Chris. Though we saw each other few times, we never introduced properly." Chris said smiling.

"Oh. Yes. I'm Cho Chang." She replied with a smile.

"Ginny."

"Colin."

They all shook hands with Cho.

"I'm really excited to meet the other school students." Cho said.

"Me too." Padma said joining them. "It's going to be a great experience. Isn't it."

"Yeah. I think so." Ginny replied.

Few other Ravenclaws joined the conversation too. Few have the idea how the Beauxbatons going to arrive.

"I've read, they've big flying horses." Said a Ravenclaw boy in hushed tone. "I think they'll be arriving in those."

"No, of course not. There are lots if students coming, they can't just arrive in horse's back. How many horses will be there?" Another girl snapped.

"Yeah true. I didn't thought like that."

"Who're going to be the judges?" Colin asked.

"Well, the Heads of the participating schools are always on the panel," said Padma, "because all three of them were injured during the Tour­nament of 1792, when a cockatrice the champions were supposed to be catching went on the rampage."

"Oh." Colin looked a little anxious.

And the conversation continued.

There was a pleasant feeling of anticipation in the air that day. Nobody was very attentive in lessons, being much more interested in the arrival that evening of the people from Beauxbatons and Durmstrang. Chris, Ginny and Colin had Transfiguration last, even Professor McGonagall looked distracted and worried during the class.

When the bell rang early, Chris, Ginny and Colin hurried up to Gryffindor Tower, deposited their bags and books as they had been instructed, pulled on their cloaks, and rushed back downstairs into the entrance hall.

The Heads of Houses were ordering their students into lines.

"Weasley, straighten your hat," Professor McGonagall snapped at Ron. "Miss Patil, take that ridiculous thing out of your hair."

Parvati scowled and removed a large ornamental butterfly from the end of her plait.

"Follow me, please," said Professor McGonagall. "First years in front … no pushing. …"

They filed down the steps and lined up in front of the castle. It was a cold, clear evening; dusk was falling and a pale, transparent-looking moon was already shining over the Forbidden Forest.

Chris, Ginny and Colin stood in the third row from the front, saw Dennis positively shivering with an­ticipation among the other first years.

"You ok Dennis?" Ginny shouted.

"Yeah I'll be fine." He replied turning.

The weather was really freezing cold. Chris shivered looking up and down, thinking how will the guests are arriving.

And then Dumbledore called out from the back row where he stood with the other teachers —

"Aha! Unless I am very much mistaken, the delegation from Beauxbatons approaches!"

"Where?" said many students eagerly, all looking in different directions.

"There!" yelled a sixth year, pointing over the forest.

Something large, much larger than a broomstick — or, indeed, a hundred broomsticks — was hurtling across the deep blue sky to­ward the castle, growing larger all the time.

"It's a dragon!" shrieked one of the first years, losing her head completely.

"Don't be stupid … it's a flying house!" said Dennis.

Dennis's guess was closer. … As the gigantic black shape skimmed over the treetops of the Forbidden Forest and the lights shining from the castle windows hit it, they saw a gigantic, powder-blue, horse-drawn carriage, the size of a large house, soaring toward them, pulled through the air by a dozen winged horses, all palomi­nos, and each the size of an elephant.

Ginny pulled Chris and Colin back as the first, second and third years drew backward and the carriage hurtled ever lower, coming in to land at a tremendous speed — then, with an almighty crash the horses' hooves, larger than dinner plates, hit the ground. A second later, the carriage landed too, bouncing upon its vast wheels, while the golden horses tossed their enormous heads and rolled large, fiery red eyes.

Chris just had time to see that the door of the carriage bore a coat of arms (two crossed, golden wands, each emitting three stars) before it opened.

A boy in pale blue robes jumped down from the carriage, bent forward, fumbled for a moment with something on the carriage floor, and unfolded a set of golden steps. He sprang back respect­fully. Then Chris saw the largest woman she had ever seen in her life. The size of the carriage, and of the horses, was im­mediately explained. Colin gasped.

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Chris had only ever seen one person as large as this woman in his life, and that was Hagrid. As she stepped into the light flooding from the entrance hall, she was revealed to have a hand­some, olive-skinned face; large, black, liquid-looking eyes; and a rather beaky nose. Her hair was drawn back in a shining knob at the base of her neck. She was dressed from head to foot in black satin, and many magnificent opals gleamed at her throat and on her thick fingers.

Dumbledore started to clap; the students, following his lead, broke into applause too, many of them standing on tiptoe, the bet­ter to look at this woman.

Her face relaxed into a gracious smile and she walked forward toward Dumbledore, extending a glittering hand. Dumbledore, though tall himself, had barely to bend to kiss it.

"My dear Madame Maxime," he said. "Welcome to Hogwarts."

"Dumbly-dorr," said Madame Maxime in a deep voice. "I 'ope I find you well?"

Few first years chuckled, hearing her accent.

"In excellent form, I thank you," said Dumbledore.

"My pupils," said Madame Maxime, waving one of her enor­mous hands carelessly behind her.

Chris noticed that about a dozen boys and girls, all, by the look of them, in their late teens, had emerged from the carriage and were now standing behind Madame Maxime. They were shivering, which was unsurprising, given that their robes seemed to be made of fine silk, and none of them were wearing cloaks. A few had wrapped scarves and shawls around their heads. From what Chris could see of them (they were standing in Madame Maxime's enormous shadow), they were staring up at Hogwarts with apprehensive looks on their faces.

" 'As Karkaroff arrived yet?" Madame Maxime asked.

"He should be here any moment," said Dumbledore. "Would you like to wait here and greet him or would you prefer to step in­side and warm up a trifle?"

"Warm up, I think," said Madame Maxime. "But ze 'orses —"

"Our Care of Magical Creatures teacher will be delighted to take care of them," said Dumbledore, "the moment he has returned from dealing with a slight situation that has arisen with some of his other — er — charges."

"My steeds require — er — forceful 'andling," said Madame Maxime, looking as though she doubted whether any Care of Mag­ical Creatures teacher at Hogwarts could be up to the job. "Zey are very strong. …"

"I assure you that Hagrid will be well up to the job," said Dum­bledore, smiling.

"Very well," said Madame Maxime, bowing slightly. "Will you please inform zis 'Agrid zat ze 'orses drink only single-malt whiskey?"

"It will be attended to," said Dumbledore, also bowing.

"Come," said Madame Maxime imperiously to her students, and the Hogwarts crowd parted to allow her and her students to pass up the stone steps.

Then most people were gazing hopefully up at the sky for Durmstrang to arrive. For a few minutes, the silence was broken only by Madame Maxime's huge horses snorting and stamping. But then Chris heard something loud and oddly eerie noise, which was drifting toward them from out of the darkness: a muffled rumbling and sucking sound, as though an immense vacuum cleaner were moving along a riverbed... And without wasting anytime Chris looked down at the lake. Chris saw something was happening in the lake, the smooth surface of the lake was disturbed.

"Look down at the lake." Chris said loudly.

Everyone turned to the lake. Now, great bub­bles were forming on the surface, waves were now washing over the muddy banks — and then, out in the very middle of the lake, a whirlpool appeared, as if a giant plug had just been pulled out of the lake's floor. …

What seemed to be a long, black pole began to rise slowly out of the heart of the whirlpool … and then Chris saw the rigging.

"They came here in a boat?" Ginny asked surprised.

Slowly, magnificently, the ship rose out of the water, gleaming in the moonlight. It had a strangely skeletal look about it, as though it were a resurrected wreck, and the dim, misty lights shimmering at its portholes looked like ghostly eyes. Finally, with a great slosh­ing noise, the ship emerged entirely, bobbing on the turbulent water, and began to glide toward the bank. A few moments later, they heard the splash of an anchor being thrown down in the shal­lows, and the thud of a plank being lowered onto the bank.

"Well it's a cool ship, I think." Chris replied grinning. "I always liked Ships. It gives me goosebumps."

People were disembarking; they could see their silhouettes passing the lights in the ship's portholes. Chris saw that their bulk was really due to the fact that they were wearing cloaks of some kind of shaggy, matted fur. But the man who was leading them up to the castle was wearing furs of a different sort: sleek and silver, like his hair.

"Dumbledore!" he called heartily as he walked up the slope. "How are you, my dear fellow, how are you?"

"Blooming, thank you, Professor Karkaroff," Dumbledore replied.

Karkaroff had a fruity, unctuous voice; when he stepped into the light pouring from the front doors of the castle they saw that he was tall and thin like Dumbledore, but his white hair was short, and his goatee (finishing in a small curl) did not entirely hide his rather weak chin. When he reached Dumbledore, he shook hands with both of his own.

"Dear old Hogwarts," he said, looking up at the castle and smil­ing; his teeth were rather yellow, and Chris noticed that his smile did not extend to his eyes, which remained cold and shrewd. "How good it is to be here, how good. … Viktor, come along, into the warmth … you don't mind, Dumbledore? Viktor has a slight head cold. …"

Karkaroff beckoned forward one of his students. As the boy passed, Ginny whispered, "It's Victor Krum."

"Great, we already know who's competing from Durmstrang." Chris replied.