Victory

"Welcome, to the first task." Dumbledore started. They were on the Quidditch pitch, but it was hardly recognisable anymore. They had built what looked like a large hall on it. It did not have a roof, so the students in the stands could look down on it and see what was happening. It had however been enchanted, so the champions could not see or hear the students.

"Behind me is a maze of some sort," Dumbledore explained. "Each time you will be faced with 6 doors. One will lead you a door closer to the end, four will lead you astray and one will eliminate you immediately."

Beth and Sirius exchanged worried glances. Dumbledore used his wand as a microphone, his voice booming out over the stands. "Your clues will help you navigate." He added, looking each champion in the eye.

"I heard alliances have been made." The four champions nodded. "Very well, you will enter as pairs. One pair from the south side, one from the north. Should you encounter each other you will know you have missed the correct door."

Should we encounter each other we will be hexed, Beth thought. "Red sparks in the air means you forfeit." He added, as though he could read her mind.

Sirius and Beth were sent to the north side of the pitch, while Cephas and Kaeley stayed south. "We'll be fine." Sirius kept repeating under his breath, only causing Beth to believe it less and less.

Professor McGonagall opened the door to the hall for them and ushered them in. It was odd stepping in there. Beth could hear the cheering and booing of the students, right until she stepped through the door. It was eerily silent.

She gripped her wand tightly in her hand. This was it, this is what she had been preparing for. She glanced over at her partner for this task, he hardly looked like Sirius Black at all. He was known to be the rock star, the bad boy all the girls fancied. But right now, he looked ready to piss himself.

Purple fireworks erupted above them, and the task had officially begun.

"One wrong door and we are eliminated," Beth repeated, walking to the first door. "Which means that one of us opens the door and risks getting eliminated, while the other looks away."

"I'll go first." He offered up, reaching for the doorknob.

"Ladies go first." She answered, hitting his hand away. Sirius instead stood in front of the sixth door, eyeing Beth as she went for the knob.

It was like playing Russian roulette. One wrong door and she was out. Even if she found one of the doors that would lead her astray she could meet Cephas or Kaeley and be eliminated. She twisted the knob.

The first thing that hit her was the salty smell of the ocean. The second thing, was an actual wave.

Sirius rushed over to look inside as well. It was like they had opened a door to the middle of the ocean. "The first will let you sea." Beth sighed, feeling all her hope drain out of her. "Sea, not see."

Sirius kicked the door, pulled his hands through his hair and walked back to the door from which they had entered the maze. His eyes shifted between the other doors. "Well, it's not three. We don't want to encounter any nasty tricks."

Beth still stared into the open ocean. She thought she could see something, a glitter on the horizon. This just couldn't be it, she thought to herself. There had to be something more to it.

She started to descend the stairs into the water. Sirius, once he noticed what she was doing, pulled her back. "Over there!" She pointed as she tried to struggle out of his grip. He was standing a few steps above her and had his arm around her shoulders.

Sirius peered and saw what she meant. There was a red glitter there. "It's the sun." He said.

"When have you ever seen a green sun?" She asked.

"It's red." He answered. "Not green."

"Red for a Gryffindor." Beth mumbled. "Green for a Slytherin." She took another step down. "We have to go Sirius. Cephas and Kaeley are probably already through to the next few doors."

Sirius remained frozen on the steps, while Beth went further into the water. She was now up to her waist in the ice-cold water, with occasional waves that hit her when she was least expecting it.

There was a stone path underneath her. She could see a black void on either side of her as she walked down it. Please let there be no creatures in here, she thought to herself. She had been watching the creatures of the black lake swim by the window in their common room for three years now, she knew how horrible they could be.

It felt like she had only crossed a few meters, but when she looked back Sirius was only a dot on the horizon, and she had only gotten closer to the light. Eventually, when she got close enough she saw a large emerald stone, with engravings in it.

'Add the names of the founding wizards and remember: What is last must sometimes be retracted by what comes first.'

Beth repeated the sentence in her head over and over on her way back. The cold water kept her from thinking about anything else, like what it could mean. When she had to climb up the stairs her legs felt rigid and awful.

"What was it?" Sirius asked her before he noticed she was shaking all over. He quickly used the Hot-Air charm, drying her clothes and allowing her to feel warm again.

" 'Add the names of the founding wizards and remember: What is last must sometimes be retracted by what comes first.' " She repeated for him.

"Add the what?" Sirius looked like he was positively freaking out, and appeared to be ready to start kicking doors down. While Beth started counting.

"Hufflepuff is ten letters, and so is Gryffindor. So that is twenty. Slytherin is nine letters and Ravenclaw is... nine too. So that is thirty-eight." She was thinking out loud. "Remember thirty-eight." she snapped at Sirius.

"Helga has five letters, plus Rowena which is six. So that is eleven plus six for Godric which is seventeen. And then Salazar. He has seven letters. Which is twenty-four." Beth counted. "Thirty-eight minus twenty-four."

"Fourteen." Sirius answered.

"One, four." Beth laughed and moved over to the fourth door. Sirius stopped her though.

"My turn." He said and twisted the knob.

Sirius wasn't struck down by lightning, nor did he get cursed. So Beth thought it would also be safe to peer into the room. There were six doors there that were identical to the ones they had left behind.

Sirius eagerly stepped in, followed by Beth. There was no way to know what to do now. Their clue had only been effective for the first round of doors, or so it would seem. Perhaps that meant that Cephas and Kaeley were blind in the first room, Beth could only hope so.

"What do we do?" Beth asked Sirius, who was pacing between the doors. "Do we just start opening doors?"

"One is correct, one will have us eliminated and the other four are incorrect." He said. "I'm guessing the incorrect ones are the exact same looking as the correct one. There is no way of knowing."

"If it is like the last one then one door will point us to the correct door." Beth said. "There could be something. A sign. There is no way they'll let us go in blind."

"That's exactly what they're doing Beth." He rolled his eyes at her, only throwing fuel onto their discussion. "Might I remind you that we have one clue and that is it."

"So what do we do then?" She snapped back. "We can't go kicking open doors. It could-"

It had started as a faint noise. Something neither of them noticed amid their discussion. However, when the knocking became louder, Beth immediately stopped talking.

The far right door slowly opened, inch by inch. At first, all they could see was a claw-like hand that ushered the door open more. Sirius took a few steps closer to Beth, ushering her behind him. His hand was gripping his wand so tight it had started to shake.

Beth placed her hand on top of his, to make sure he would not try and curse whatever came out of it. 'When the door starts knocking, you'll find it best to stop talking.' She doubted he was able to do a nonverbal spell.

The door was now only a quarter of the way open, but suddenly a head popped out of it. It was like the animal was wearing a mask, though its piercing red eyes still remained prominent. The mask was made of gold and silver, with runes carved into it. Beth had never seen an animal like it before. Its body was like a snake, with great black claws as hands, and it seemed to be flying on a black smoke cloud.

"Hello." It greeted the unusual couple. Its voice was high-pitched and shrill. "To go to the end you must first answer my riddle." His eyes were completely focused on Sirius, without blinking, as he came closer to them. He twisted around his head, like a dog when they don't understand what you are saying. Sirius almost seemed like he was in a trance.

Beth squeezed his hand, pulling him back down on earth. He glanced behind him to see the young Slytherin nearly shaking in fear. The creature realised the connection had been lost, and moved on to Beth, staring into her grey eyes with the same intensity as they had stared into Sirius'.

"Pretty lady," he said to her, his long claw tracing along her collarbone. "Answer my riddle pretty lady."

Without the creature to distract him, Sirius felt his mind clear up. The creature was trying to get them to talk. If they did they would get eliminated. However, the creature had left the door open, the door Sirius was betting on being the right one.

The creature started circling them, preparing to say his riddle out loud. Sirius tugged on Beth's cold hand, urging her to go with him. She glanced back at him and away from the creature. She, however, did not think it was the right door, she thought they must answer the riddle.

They could not speak, they could only silently stare each other down. The stare was only broken by the eruption of red sparks in the distance.

Either Cephas or Kaeley had given up. Though both of them hoped it to be Cephas, Kaeley was the likely culprit. The red sparks reminded Beth of the creature, what was it the riddle had said again?

She could feel herself coming back to her own body again. The creature had infiltrated her mind, she had been so close to talking. She stopped struggling against Sirius and followed him into the new room.

The creature howled loudly, a sound like she had never heard before. It sounded like the cry of a werewolf, mixed with the hiss of a snake. It was deafening and only stopped when Sirius closed the door behind them.

They stared at each other for some time, trying to get their heartbeats to slow down. The creature had been terrifying, to say the least, but they had found the correct door through it.

"Three has got some nasty tricks." Beth finally said. "They were talking about... that thing. Not door three."

After catching their breath they were forced to continue. They were faced with the doors again but were all out of clues this time around. "There is nothing else to be done." Sirius said. He took a step forward and opened the third door. Behind it was an identical room to the one they were in right now.

"I don't think it's that one, Sirius." Beth said as he stepped inside. "We have to solve or do something first. Then we know for sure."

"We don't have time." He argued. "Cephas is probably at the finish line already."

"If we get it wrong now we'll only go further astray." Beth said. She went to another door, her hand hovering over the handle. If she got it wrong, she could be eliminated. She would come in third, which meant that she just helped Gryffindor get higher on the list but didn't improve herself.

Her fingers touched the cold metal and before her cowardly mind could convince her otherwise she swung the wooden door open. She waited for Dumbledore to appear to tell her she failed, or for the disappointed look on her father's face, but neither came. In front of her was a dark room, with one single light on the table.

There were potions there, eight of them to be exact. They were placed in the order of the rainbow, rounding off with one white potion and one black. Beth and Sirius entered the room, both staring silently at the table.

"For potions it is best to remember the colour of December." Beth said out loud. They were separated, with the table in the middle of them.

"Has to be red or white." Sirius said. Beth nodded, pulling the two bottles out of the line. The glass that held the red liquid was tall and thin, while the white one was more shaped like a Christmas ball.

"Or green." Beth added and pulled that one out of the lineup. This one was in a golden cup, making it seem even more likely. "How do we know?"

Sirius did not have an answer to this. He walked around the table three times, picked up both the bottles and the cup and sniffed the liquid. "They smell like nothing." He announced. He then started to swirl the liquid around, as though something magical would happen.

Beth's mind was racing with ideas. Perhaps it was the green one because it was in a cup rather than a bottle. Or maybe the white one, because it looked like an ornament. Instinctively, Beth's hand wrapped around her necklace. Her father had given it to her so long ago. It was a birthday present, so she could-

"It's blue." She said. "The December birthstone is blue. It has to be the blue one."

"The clue doesn't mention birthstones." Sirius didn't seem as sure as Beth was. "Besides, birthstones is just a bunch of superstitious bulls-" His eyes landed on the Zircon gemstone in between her fingers. He did not finish his sentence, but he still did not think it was right.

Beth grabbed the bottle with the icy blue liquid in it. The bottle itself was the most plain out of all of them. Sirius eventually went for red. They stared at each other silently for a few moments.

"So, this is it then." He said, his voice almost regretful.

"It was a good alliance while it lasted." She answered. He nodded silently. "Please drink this one too. It is the correct one, I know it is."

"Sorry love." He said and popped open the cork on the bottle. "It's this one. Feel free to admit you're wrong and follow me."

He brought the bottle to his lips and swallowed down some of the liquid. In the blink of an eye, he was suddenly gone. There were no red sparks, no teachers or anything. Beth did not know if he had been correct or not. The bottle had reappeared in the rainbow line up, as though nothing had ever happened to it.

Her heart was racing, her hands were sweaty. She needed to make the decision. Would she assume he was right and follow, or follow with her gut feeling? It had to be the blue one, it was the only one with a reason for it being the correct one.

She opened the bottle, took one last glance at where Sirius once was, and drank the blue liquid.

Beth's legs gave out from under her as she reappeared in the new room. She quickly scrambled back on her feet and pointed her wand into the room. It was completely dark and empty, with only one door a few meters away from her.

She wasn't sure if this would be the door to the exit or to victory. All she could do was step forward and find out. Her hands were sweating and shaking, her heart was still pounding loudly in her chest. There was nothing else to do, she convinced herself, and opened the door. The room behind it was circular. In the middle stood a sword. It was old and rusty, and definitely had not been used in ages. She had made it, this was the end.

The room had several more doors to it, all could lead to the room she was now in. They were all still locked, she was the first to have reached this.

She couldn't help but feel that this had to be another test. It was far too simple to just touch the sword. She took a few steps forward, a purple and blue light started shining on the sword. The light painfully reflected against the blade into her eyes. She was so focused on the sword, that she did not hear the door behind her opening up.

"Impedimenta!" Cephas cried.