Harry Potter 04 - Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

aware of the way his heart was pumping fast, and his fingers tingling with fear … yet at the same time, he seemed to be outside himself, seeing the walls of the tent, and hearing the crowd, as though from far away …
    ‘Very daring!’ Bagman was yelling, and Harry heard the Chinese Fireball emit a horrible, roaring shriek, while the crowd drew its collective breath. ‘That’s some nerve he’s showing – and – yes, he’s got the egg!’
    Applause shattered the wintery air like breaking glass; Krum had finished – it would be Harry’s turn at any moment.
    He stood up, noticing dimly that his legs seemed to be made of marshmallow. He waited. And then he heard the whistle blow. He walked out through the entrance of the tent, the panic rising into a crescendo inside him. And now he was walking past the trees, through a gap in the enclosure fence.
    He saw everything in front of him as though it was a very highly coloured dream. There were hundreds and hundreds of faces staring down at him from stands which had been magicked there since he’d last stood on this spot. And there was the Horntail, at the other end of the enclosure, crouched low over her clutch of eggs, her wings half furled, her evil, yellow eyes upon him, a monstrous, scaly black lizard, thrashing her spiked tail, leaving yard-long gouge marks in the hard ground. The crowd was making a great deal of noise, but whether friendly or not, Harry didn’t know or care. It was time to do what he had to do … to focus his mind, entirely and absolutely, upon the thing that was his only chance …
    He raised his wand.
    ‘Accio Firebolt!’ he shouted.
    He waited, every fibre of him hoping, praying … if it hadn’t worked … if it wasn’t coming … he seemed to be looking at everything around him through some sort of shimmering, transparent barrier, like a heat haze, which made the enclosure and the hundreds of faces around him swim strangely …
    And then he heard it, speeding through the air behind him; he turned and saw his Firebolt hurtling towards him around the edge of the woods, soaring into the enclosure, and stopping dead in mid-air beside him, waiting for him to mount. The crowd was making even more noise … Bagman was shouting something … but Harry’s ears were not working properly any more … listening wasn’t important …
    He swung his leg over the broom, and kicked off from the ground. And a second later, something miraculous happened …
    As he soared upwards, as the wind rushed through his hair, as the crowd’s faces became mere flesh-coloured pinpricks below, and the Horntail shrank to the size of a dog, he realised that he had left not only the ground behind, but also his fear … he was back where he belonged …
    This was just another Quidditch match, that was all … just another Quidditch match, and that Horntail was just another ugly opposing team …
    He looked down at the clutch of eggs, and spotted the gold one, gleaming against its cement-coloured fellows, residing safely between the dragon’s front legs. ‘OK,’ Harry told himself, ‘diversionary tactics … let’s go …’
    He dived. The Horntail’s head followed him; he knew what it was going to do, and pulled out of the dive just in time; a jet of fire had been released exactly where he would have been had he not swerved away … but Harry didn’t care … that was no more than dodging a Bludger …
    ‘Great Scott, he can fly!’ yelled Bagman, as the crowd shrieked and gasped. ‘Are you watching this, Mr Krum?’
    Harry soared higher in a circle; the Horntail was still following his progress; its head revolving on its long neck – if he kept this up, it would be nicely dizzy – but better not push it too long, or it would be breathing fire again –
    Harry plummeted just as the Horntail opened its mouth, but this time he was less lucky – he missed the flames, but the tail came whipping up to meet him instead, and as he swerved to the left, one of the long spikes grazed his shoulder, ripping his robes –
    He could feel it stinging, he could hear screaming and groans from the crowd, but the cut didn’t seem to be deep … now he zoomed around the back of the Horntail, and a possibility occurred to him …
    The Horntail didn’t seem to want to take off, she was too protective of her eggs. Though she writhed and twisted, furling and unfurling her wings and keeping those fearsome yellow eyes on Harry, she was afraid to move too far from them …