He knew there were another few minutes of easy cruising before he approached the harpy nests, and took the time to think about preparing a strategy. Should he charge ahead? Sneak past? He hadn't practiced disillusionment charms the past few weeks. Mental note, disillusionment is very useful, thought Harry. Perhaps his best bet was to simply fly through, dodging as best he could. As he approached, Fleur rocketed past him, her broom carrying her. Once again, she cast a disillusionment charm on herself as she bypassed the harpies. Hm, if the Harpies rely on sight so much, maybe I can just blind them, thought harry. Performing the same spell that Fleur had used against the Zuu, he shouted "Lumos Fulgos!" as he shielded his eyes. Several harpies screamed, clawing blindly in a daze, he dodged them easily, but already the ones further away were beginning to advance on him. It would tire him out if he had to cast this constantly... he decided to dodge where he could and only use it if the harpies were beginning to overwhelm him.
Several scratches and about eight flares later, he was past the harpies. Krum wasn't too far behind, as Harry heard the gruff voice shouting spells while Harpies screamed. Fleur was long gone by now, but he had to do whatever he could to fend off Krum. Coming up to the logpile, he saw that Fleur had blasted away a few more, making a much clearer path through what was originally a jungle-gym of logs. Flying through the most obvious, open path, Harry began firing quick flame spells at the logs. A few of them caught fire. Harry smiled, knowing that within a few minutes Krum would have to stop to put out a few fires to get through the maze.
It completely surprised him, then, when he realized it didn't even slow Krum down. He heard him approaching from behind... taking a quick peek back, it seemed that Krum had simply cast a few flame-freezing charms where he could, and let his robes catch fire instead of slowing down. He was desperate to win at least second in this competition. Coming up to the vine-net, Harry knew this would be his last chance to stop Krum, who had caught up to him and they were once again racing neck-and-neck. Krum sensed victory as he prepared another flame hex. Harry knew that Krum was slightly faster, and if he couldn't stop Krum here, he'd definitely lose. Thinking quickly, he cast a Flame-freezing charm right on the tail of Krum's flame hex, and immediately pulled into a sharp dive. Krum's hex hit the net, immediately setting it on fire again, but the flame-freezing hex prevented the net from burning through. Harry flew underneath like the first time around, while Krum, surprised that his flames didn't cut a hole in the net, crashed straight into it and got himself tangled.
Harry flew past the finish line without looking back. The crowd roared as Bagman announced, "...and in second place, Harry Potter! He clocks in with a time of one hour, fifty-three minutes, and eighteen seconds. This should factor very well into his scores." He was tired, his body was aching, his ears were ringing, and his throat was dry. He saw officials waving at him to go to the medical tent for a checkup, and he stumbled his way there in a daze. Inside the tent, he immediately grabbed a cup of juice and gulped it down, and immediately went for another. Four cups later, the mediwitches finally got him to walk over to one of the beds, where they closed the curtains around him as he sat down. With his head throbbing and heart pounding, he knew it would be a while before he was back to feeling normal.
The mediwitches began their checkup, immediately noticing the damage to his ears. "I knew those bats were far too dangerous! You could have been permanently deafened," one of them muttered. After dripping a potion into each of his ears, Harry almost immediately felt the ringing disappear, and some of the dizziness faded away. Looking into each of his eyes, the witches were once again surprised.
"This chart says here that only two weeks ago your eyesight needed correction, and there's no record of you coming in for the procedure. You've done it already? And it appears it's better than normal, in fact."
"Um, a friend and I brewed the potion ourselves... and it was a different version, one that was tailored to me," Harry said. "She told me it would work better than the standard potion they give at St. Mungo's."
"You didn't see a healer about it instead? You could have gone blind, or worse!"
Harry shrugged. "I'm confident in my friend's brewing abilities. It's over, it worked, so let's just leave it at that, alright?"
Shaking her head in frustration, the mediwitch proceeded to check up on his other wounds, most of which were superficial. The majority came from crashing into the walls of the narrow ravine and scratches by the harpies on the way back. A few simple spells healed them, and a single potion took care of the light bruising and aches. Noticing a small tear at the back of his robes, she asked Harry to remove his shirt. Without thinking, he began taking it off, but suddenly realized his mistake. He quickly pulled his shirt back down, but it was already too late.
"What on earth happened to your back, Mr. Potter?"
"Nothing. Old wounds. A quick Episkey should fix up the scratch I got today," Harry tried to make up as an excuse.
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