Chapter Text
The summons had come as something of a surprise for the Headmaster of Hogwarts, and apparently also for the Directrice of Beauxbatons and Schulleiter of Durmstrang—to such an extent that, apparently, Tom Riddle hadn’t been the only one to think twice about going alone.
“I don’t like this,” Myrtle said over his shoulder as soon as the other figures came into view, little more than shadows in the forest. “Why now? It’s been centuries, hasn’t it, since the last—?”
“Two centuries,” Riddle answered, “or thereabouts.”
“It’s surely not a coincidence that it’s happening again now. Not with how things have been changing in the Ministry, and how the Order has been rallying?”
Riddle shushed her with a gesture, which she did not seem pleased about, but also did not protest—after all, those shadows were getting closer.
In centuries past, Riddle had rather recently learned, this place was a resplendent monument, a gleaming marble edifice shining even in the densest parts of the rugged wildlands stretching between Hamburg and Berlin. Perhaps the stories had been overblown, or perhaps time had left too strong a mark, but to Riddle’s eye, there was nothing gleaming or monumental left about it.
The forest floor overtook what once may have been an impressive, circular stone dais, leaving it choked with underbrush and split through on one side by a great crack. The surrounding trees loomed overhead, their canopies so dense as to keep the area quite dark even in the bright midmorning sun—or they would have done, but for the Goblet of Fire, burning bright blue in the eerie dimness.
“Hail, fellow masters of ze Great Three,” said the tallest of the figures, voice clear and commanding through the obscuring mist.
“Hail?” scoffed another figure, somewhat further off, who tripped over a root and then struggled back to his feet as if hoping no one had noticed. “It’s not the 1700’s anymore, Olympe.”
“Ze magic zat pulled us all here is still strong, Igor, and clearly worth ’onoring.”
Each pair of two made it to the edge of the overgrown stone dais at about the same time, but all seemed to think twice before daring to step onto it. At least, Riddle supposed, he now had a clear view of all of them.
Olympe Maxime, towering several feet over the woman who Riddle supposed must have been her deputy or some equivalent, stood to his left, dark-haired and elegant and nervous. Riddle had met her before, briefly, at a formal function he’d gone to as a guise for sniffing out the Ashbringer’s old contacts on the Continent.
Igor Karkaroff made an interesting contrast to his right. Though he was only about half of Maxime’s size, he made up for it with twice the attitude. He was quite thin, with a weak jaw not adequately hidden by his small, curling goatee. He was dressed all in black, and had the look of man who would have rather been anywhere else. Riddle had also met Karkaroff before, and found him just as distasteful as he had the first time.
“I don’t trust it,” Karkaroff said, eying the Goblet of Fire, still blazing on its pedestal. “Two hundred years, this thing’s been quiet—and now, suddenly, it calls us together again?”
“Perhaps ze Goblet believes zat old alliances must be strengthened,” Maxime answered diplomatically.
“Or perhaps the damned thing is broken.”
“Would you care to put it to ze test, Igor,” Maxime said unsmilingly, “and deny its call?”
Karkaroff’s thin mouth twisted, and his dark eyes moved rapidly up and down the pillar before lingering, nervously, on the Goblet itself.
The man behind him—surely his deputy, as well, as everything Riddle had read so far suggested that the Goblet would tolerate no one else in its presence—cleared his throat nervously and leaned forward to mutter something into Karkaroff’s ear in German. Whatever he said, it made Karkaroff sneer and wave him off.
Then, eventually, Karkaroff turned his gaze to Riddle.
“And what about you? Nothing to say?”
In fact, nothing was precisely what Riddle wanted to say. Riddle was much more interested in action.
He stepped up onto the stone dais slowly, despite Myrtle’s nervous whine of protest, crunching through dry bramble and loose gravel and up to the Goblet of Fire, still burning.
His eyes scanned the gleaming golden surface carefully. The magic that came off it was strong to the point of being painful, stinging his skin like nettle the closer he drew. Nothing about it felt broken. In fact, Riddle had never felt anything quite so complete—nor, indeed, quite so hungry.
“Is it…?” Maxime began hesitantly.
“Viable,” Riddle answered. “And intent. It is not going to let us leave until we activate it.”
“Tom,” Myrtle said behind him anxiously.
“The magic is as it was designed,” Riddle told her, and his fellow schoolmasters. “Ironclad. It demands our cooperation. A relic of the era in which it was created, when differences between our schools nearly drove the Wizarding World to war.”
“That was over eight hundred years ago!” Karkaroff protested.
“Perhaps it believes itself necessary again,” Maxime said.
“You should both join me before it loses its patience,” Riddle added.
Maxime was the first, with only a breath of hesitation. Karkaroff came after, walking as though to a gallows.
And as soon as all three were standing on the dais, the blue fire in the Goblet blazed brighter. They drew their wands.
“Hail, fellow masters of the Great Three,” Riddle said, then extended his wand so the very tip touched the rim of the Goblet. “Hogwarts.”
“Beauxbatons,” Maxime added, following the gesture with her own wand.
“Durmstrang,” Karkaroff said unhappily, though he mimicked the movement as well.
The blue fire blazed as bright as the sun—and then abruptly snuffed itself out. When the afterimage faded from Riddle’s eyes, the only thing left glowing was Maxime’s wand, the same bright blue as the fire had been.
She smiled wonderingly. “What an ’onor,” she whispered.
“It’s decided, then,” Riddle said, and slid his wand away. “The next Triwizard Tournament will be held at Beauxbatons.”
From behind, Myrtle muttered, “Crouch is going to be furious about this.”