Chapter Six

Harry, finally undressed, lay in his bed.

He caressed the small elegant letters on the back of the watch with his thumb. The inscription was a message. No, that wasn't the right word.

Words of wisdom, the demoness had said. The clock was to remind him of horrible things that didn't happen because somebody heeded these words.

He'd had more than enough horrible things in his short life, but not lately. If he were to pinpoint a moment in time when they stopped happening, he'd say it was the night the Goblet of Fire selected, inexplicably, nine extra champions.

Inexplicably, yes.

The ministry had settled for 'erratic malfunction', meaning they didn't have a clue.

The immediate investigation that Fudge had ordered to be conducted didn't yield any results because Crouch Snr had been far too busy obliterating evidence of his own misdeeds, namely smuggling his Death Eater son out of Azkaban, to do anything else.

Pettigrew had said no more than that Voldemort had been planning to use the Tournament to pull some nefarious trick. Harry was sure that whatever the plan had been, the outcome would have proved horrible for him. Having to face a bloody dragon on his own would already have been bad enough, and Voldemort's scheming wouldn't have stopped at that.

Needless to say, Pettigrew hadn't known any details. Nobody trusts a traitor.

Harry and his friends had spent many an hour trying to piece together what had happened. By the look of it, Voldemort had ordered his faithful servant Crouch Jnr to bewitch the Goblet and to drop in Harry's name. The younger Crouch had made all but a full confession when he put forth his 'theory' on how the Goblet had been tampered with. Then an as-yet-unknown person had probably made the plot backfire on its mastermind. Somebody acting in retaliation would explain why Riddle's name and those of his minions came out of the Goblet. It might also explain to some extent why Snape was entered into the Tournament. The git had been a Death Eater in his youth.

But why Fudge? Why Dumbledore? Malfoy? And why on earth Rita?

Harry doubted that he would ever get a solid answer. Nobody seemed to have one.

Did this night's encounter have anything to do with the events of last autumn, or was the strange clock with its blue face an entirely unrelated puzzle?

He would discuss it tomorrow with his friends.

About to slip the demoness's gift under his pillow, Harry read the inscription one more time: The Quill is Mightier Than the Wand.

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The End

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Thanks to Oriel Subtle for beta reading. :)